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Latest Behavior Articles
It’s a Dog’s Life
By Cecelia Sumner
Not surprisingly, I love living with dogs. I embrace their essential dogginess. Barking, jumping, digging, hunting, these are all normal canine behaviors. I recognize I need to provide an outlet for these behaviors to keep my dogs happy and stress-free.
Many pet owners ...
Setting the Right Criteria
By K. Holden Svirsky
Guppy, a young male “pit bull” and German shepherd dog mix, didn’t know how to sit. Or, more accurately, he didn’t know how to sit on cue. To be considered adoptable by the suburban families that frequented the shelter, this was a pretty important behavior. Guppy was ...
More Articles
Why Self-Control is Better than “Discipline”
The Oxford Dictionary defines 'discipline' as: 'The practice of training people to obey rules or a code of behavior, using punishment to correct disobedience.' The word 'discipline' not only carries with it the baggage of "force" and ...
Six Myths about Positive Reinforcement-Based Training
Positive reinforcement-based training is subject to a lot of misunderstanding and misrepresentation. Many people genuinely don’t understand how it works, and others seem to deliberately misrepresent it. Some of these misunderstandings and ...
Sheepherding, from the Lamb’s Perspective (Part Two)
Following my first interview with the lambs I was intrigued and felt even more determined to understand the experience of sheepherding from their perspective, so the next time Renee brought Chris and Rue to practice I went into covert “sheep ...
How Best Not to Catch a Loose Dog
Stolen dogs are constantly in the news at the moment. Losing a dog is not always because someone has taken him, however. He may have simply run off and become lost or have been stolen then dumped. He may have escaped from the yard, something ...
“Be NICE!”
If I’m a dog, and I’m on a leash, and another dog invades my space, I’m gonna growl. That’s just how I feel. Back the heck off, pal! I can’t get away from you, on account of I’m on a leash! That means you need to get away from me. Please and ...
Taming the Beast
Written by Diane Garrod BSc, this article was originally published in BARKS from the Guild, June 2014.
Managing an aggressive dog is a permanent commitment but it is most definitely possible.
Owning an aggressive dog creates immediate ...
Socializing a Formerly Feral Dog
When I started this blog, I assumed that I would write a lot about Clara’s training. Clara burst into my life as a 10 week old feral puppy [see note at end about feral dogs], and her socialization window was in the process of closing by the ...
Nothing Changes if Nothing Changes
This article was written by Barb Levenson BS and first published in BARKS from the Guild (2014, April) pp. 26-27.
Are you shouting cues or asking your dog for behaviors with a soft tone of voice? In a beginner rally class one night, I had an ...