Cesar Milan - How not to deal with food guarding

It seems the dog abuser is back for a new series.
I know loads of people love him and will be totaly up in arms with me calling him an abuser - but please take the time to watch

In this clip Cesar confronts Holly, a food agressive dog. He is called in because the family have a new baby and are justifiably concerned.
Cesar right from the start is spoiling for a fight, his crouched position and staring hard eyes are really aggressive to a dog but Holly tries to eat.
He then tries to put his hand in the bowl and she snarls at him.
At this point any decent trainer would have seen all they need to - she guards food an could bite if pushed
But no - Cesar has to push it further. His instant response is a punch/slap to the side of her jaw
(the camera jerks at this point so it is difficult to see if its a punch or one of his hand jabs - but its full force)
Agression leads to agression - causing pain increases adrenaline and makes a dog more likely to want to attack
He advances on Holly, she backs up - she is showing her teeth at him but also backing up and licking her lips - all her trying to comunicate with him that she is uncomfy and feeling trapped.
If she was agressive she wouldnt warn him - but she does - lots - and he keeps pushing her
Eventually she lies down and is turning her head away - she is trying to diffuse the situation. He puts his cupped hand onto her nose - I am not sure if he thinks he is patting her at this point - but she sees it as an attack and responds the only way she knows how - she bites him

Compare this with how another dog trainer deals with a similar dog

 

Victoria can see the dog is likely to snap and so keeps everyone safe. She teaches the dog that people being close to his bowl is a good thing - there is no showdown, no 'man verses beast' just calm training that anyone can do

Unfortunatly for Holly there is no happy ending. Cesar decides Holly is now to agressive for the family and moves her into his 'pack'

Watching him interact with these dogs is so very sad. The dogs are not well behaived not jumping on him and greeting him - they are frozen stressed statues. Lip licking is very much a sign of stress, as is the fixed 'grins' on the dog
Poor Holly, another dog failed by Cesar, a problem that is fixed daily by many behaviourist and trainers all over the world - in the hands of Cesar this poor girl lost her home and has a bite history on her record

Pekingese

Return to A-z of dog breeds

Beginners agility training

Sadly I had to step down as Phoenix Flyers beginners trainer.
I have totaly loved working with all my beginners and they have come along great this summer
Here is a video of one of my beginners running their first full course on one of my last training times with them

Cola, I am very proud of how far they have come
and  a photo from my Tuesday night class - great group of dogs

But as one door closes :) although I am sad to be leaving these guys it has very much given me a boot up the backside to get an exciting new project underway. May take a little while to get off the ground but - watch this space

A-Z needle felted dog breeds - Miniature Schnauzer

<< this book was the thing that got me into needle felting in the first place. The little felted Schnauzer caught my eye, it dropped into my shopping basket and from that moment I was hooked.
Every now and again I have a go at making Schnauzers because they always make me smile









Return to A-Z dog breeds index

A-Z of dog breeds - Border Collie

Here is a little collection of all the border collies I have felted over the years

 Thats a whole lotta collies :D remember and have a look in my shop if you like these

Return to A-Z of needle felted dogs

A needle felted spanial

Dog agility contact re-training

Here is stage two in retraining my dogs the 4 on the floor contacts

I am training them to run to the mat and lie down on it, hopefully facing in the direction they were traveling and not curving back to me. I think that bit will be difficult but I will keep working on it.
At the moment Ben seems to often have a nice striding pattern down the contact running all the way down with good seperation between his back paws - so that looks good for a possible running contact eventually
Mia I will have to work on more, she is going down the contact but the last step her back paws are together and she is jumping onto the contact mat - but still getting her contacts

Speed felting

Would you like to see how I made this little guy??
Not a tutorial but a speed video
I filmed about 4 hours of me making this guy then I have speeded it up into a 10 min film.
Hopefully it will be interesting and helpfull to some people - I loved watching the eyebrows and eyes take shape in high speed

Hope you all like it, it was fun to make - if we get a sunny enough day again I might make another one

Agility training contest

First time I have done anything like this - so I am a little nervous and excited
Please be gentle with me
This compatition is to raise money for Phoenix Flyers Dog agility club (a non profit training club) and Dogs Trust.
And the prize is your choice of breed of a small simple felted dog as seen in my 'value' range in my shop

Entries are open to Club members, Beginners and worldwide and are £1 per dog
You can join at any time while the contest is open (Up till Midnight 31st July 2012)
Either enter in person or paypal pamduthie@hotmail.com leaving a message with the name of your dog

Submit your compleated entry at any time during the month - either as a video response to my video

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEu4rggisLM

 Or to be filmed at training :) or post a link to your video as a response to this blog post.

The compatition is agility flat/circle work exercises. There are lots of training tutorials for this on youtube - check out

 

You get points for each level and the dog with the most points by the end of the month wins

Level 1

Walking with dog on left                           1 point

Walking with dog on right                         1 point

Level 2

Walking anticlockwise - dog on outside    1 point

Walking clockwise - dog on outside         1 point

Walking anticlockwise - dog on inside      2 points

Walking anticlockwise - dog on inside      2 points

Level 3

Running with dog on left                          1 point

Running with dog on right                        1 point

Running Clockwise dog outside               2 points

Running anticlockwise Dog outside          2 points

Running clockwise dog inside                  3 points

Running anticlockwise dog inside             3 points

Level 4

Walking front cross LHS to RHS             3 points

Walking front cross RHS to LHS             3 points

Level 5

Running front cross LHS to RHS             4 points

Running front cross RHS to LHS             4 points

Total of 34 available points - and my decision is final :)

Good luck, I cant wait to see how everyone gets on

Retraining the contact

When I started agility with Ben it was just a fun class - and he very quickly learnt to jump off the contact equipment.
Going to classes we were taught a 4 on the floor contact - this means the dog runs to the end of the contact and lies down on the floor. It works really well, except that I didnt have my own equipment to practise at home so only having a go every now and again in class ment Ben never really 'got it'
I did build my own 'inside agility contacts' which in my tiny sitting room wasnt ideal - but actually worked quite nicely

But again as I didnt have access to real equipment very often I didnt really manage to transfer the skill from the inside small plank of wood to actual equipment - also of course the most he saw contact equipment was at a show where I had to keep running if he jumped a contact - so things were getting worse

But now I have access to a field and equipment when ever I want it - so I have decided to attempt to train these bloomin contacts - and - gulp - to also record it so everyone can see my mistakes!!

So the cunning plan!
From 'Control unleased' (if you dont have this book and own a dog you really should get it!!) I have already taught my pair to run to and lie down on a mat

So I figured this is a good start - thats all a 4 on the floor is!!

BUT a problem with the mat - and many people also have with 4 on the floor - is that the dogs curve back towards you - when we really want them facing forwards

So for the past few days I have been working on teaching them to go to the mat but keep facing in the direction they were going in by clicking early - way before they lie down and before they even turn back to me - then chucking the treat overhead so they are expecting a reward infront of them.
Then once they are anticipating this and facing forward more waiting with the click till they lie down again

I also did a brand new thing (for me) rewarding with the ball launcher too - this is new for the dogs too so they did really well realising what I wanted from them