I have completed my required 12 lessons with my aggressive dog. Are we done?
Dear Student,
Your request was that I outline what we would be doing in the future— now that you have completed the basic 12 lesson commitment. Below, you will find my very detailed answer. It will not give you a short, clear black and white picture, but hopefully it will satisfy the both of you. I feel that there has been a miscommunication in the understanding of the learning process in terms of what can be accomplished, and how. So here are some specific behavior notes that are fundamental in obtaining our goals.
- You must earn respect from the dog in order to have her listen to you. One cannot bribe or abuse the dog. To command respect, it truly must be earned.
- Dogs learn one of two ways: social learning— dog to dog, or by trial and error—which includes working with humans.
- For average dog owners, the easiest way for them to earn respect is through quality obedience training. I prefer to use the words pack function rather than obedience, as I believe that it gives everyone a more clear picture of why we do what we do the way we do it.
- All too often people look at our classic basics — sit, stay, come and heel — as very superficial physical exercises that result in the dog listening on the surface and therefore viewing the handler as the pack leader. But this is an illusion. There are degrees of responsiveness, and there are also various methodologies. When treats are at the center of motivating the dog, most often the dog cannot be trusted in very challenging scenarios due to a priority shift in the moment. When abusive methods are used, the handler most often will have destroyed whatever chance he/she had of having a quality, positive relationship with the dog. Teaching a dog is deep, real deep! The handler must teach the dog in a way that will improve their relationship not just physically, but emotionally too.
- When a handler earns the dog’s respect by teaching the dog the basics as they maintain a quality mechanical and emotional presentation, pack function reaches an optimum level. It reaches that high level because of how consistent your handling is. The dog must hear, see, and feel the same thing coming from a handler each and every time.
- If there are any flaws in your presentation (emotions/mechanics), then a challenging dog — with fear, dominance, prey/chase instinct, etc.— will not be able to reach that optimal degree of listening/pack function. If on a weekly basis, as we work together on the basics, I can point out mistakes that continually need fine tuning, then my presence is still needed. Handlers cannot improve if they are unaware of their own mistakes. And week after week — on their own — the dog is observing them failing. In the case where a student might feel we are doing the same thing over and over and over each week, but the dog’s performance is not improving for the handler, then the handler is not doing what the teacher says. Therefore the student does not understand the gravity of doing exactly what the teacher says. A dog that is eager to please and very impressionable certainly will not be as demanding of their handler, but your dog most definitely will.
- I should not be able to see any mechanical errors coming from the handler other than what might be completely unavoidable. Emotionally, you should be able to turn your individual feelings on and off as needed. With an aggressive dog of the caliber that yours is, anything less than this performance will certainly result in failure in most environments that the dog views as stressful.
True pack leader performance should be demonstrated consistently over a month or so prior to being on your own. This performance should be across the board with the all the different variables in the environments that you’re concerned about.
- People have deadlines for dogs but dogs don’t have deadlines! The first 4 or even 6 lessons of the basics are fairly straightforward, yes — that’s initial downloading time. But after that, as the teacher, I keep in mind what our goals are and every week we plug away, working to get us all where we have to be, and so I usually don’t have specific lesson plans. I know where we left off last time, on the whole how the dog is doing, what you tell me happened during the week, and how our initial warm up has gone on that given day. Then, based on all of those components, I formulate our lesson as it happens. Pack leaders must be very structured, must know what they are doing and have terrific foresight— But there must also be flexibility, factoring in the individual dog, owner and how they work together in the environment at hand. Can you imagine if you went into a psychologist’s office and asked, “so doc— I have a horrible temper and get into fights in certain situations. How long will it take for you to fix my problems? Can you give me an outline and timeline of what we will do together during our sessions?” If anyone gives you specific answers to those questions when you sit down in the chair, my recommendation would be to stand back up and walk out the door!
- Also: dogs should learn, absorb and retain things in plateaus. They must digest and do well at something before they are pushed through the next stress test. If that’s not done, then you increase the likelihood of day #1 issues happening late in the game.
- So having said all that, the conclusion of training should be when we have successfully accomplished this with the dog:
1. The dog can stay for 10 minutes at a distance of at least 30 feet from the handler.
2. The dog can stay in all environments of concern for 5 minutes at a leash length’s distance away.
3. The dog can stay for 5 minutes near the distractions it views as positive and negative.
4. The dog can do 5 consecutive recalls from 20 – 80 feet away with distractions of interest present.
5. The dog can perform the heel in all environments of concern, where the handler gives no more than 2 tugs per minute for a minimum of 10 minutes.
6. #1-5 will be done with the distractions of concern in the environments starting off with the most controlled setting gradually working to the handlers placing themselves in a more vulnerable setting to the dog as the dog has
proven that they have earned it.
***As we move forward the dog will continually reveal where we are at, what limitations may exists for us and clearly at the appropriate time when we are done.
***Typically aggressive dogs of her nature usually take 6 – 12 months from start to finish.
*** This process does not take into account the less than perfect world we live in, where time and money can influence the degree of follow through that occurs.
