Ceasar M. has his own mag

Of course it's boring. At work we constantly have "tourists" who want to come and see "the exciting world of service dog training!" What they don't realize is that the dogs aren't doing "real" service behaviors until just before they move on to their new homes, so it takes a lot of imagination to figure out what their behaviors might look like in the end. And that's if you're lucky enough to see an advanced dog.... Most of our dogs are learning the difference between "sit" and "down." I think even most trainers are bored with that lesson.

Besides that, personally, I don't watch Victoria Stillwell's show. Why not? Because I find her boring. I don't watch Cesar's show either, but that's because it raises my blood pressure to unhealthy levels.

I taught her how to stay calm in her crate when I was letting her out because she would paw at the crate before. I basically waited till she calmed down before letting her out and to get her to calm down told her to lay down. When she got up I would tell her to lay down again and would not let her out until she was completely calm. It took her about a week before learning that and then I threw in the wait command that she had already learned previously. I have her wait while I am out of the bedroom where her crate is with the crate door open and I then get her poop bag and leash ready. Then I say come on when I am at the front door. She does not come out of the crate until then. Sometimes it could be 30 seconds sometimes it will be five minutes. The few times that she came out on her own I would have her walk in her crate again and wait again. There are a few times when I open the door from the outside that she has come in before me and those times I have her come out again and wait at the door while I go in first. Then I make sure she has eye contact with me and say come on and she comes in. I have never gotten physical with her and will never do that.

As for the treats on the floor just tonight we were at the Library so that the kids could read to her. We have 5 or so dogs and all the kids switch every ten minutes or so giving them the chance to be with all the dogs. One of the girls got a treat from one of the other people that had her dog there and came over and gave it to Lola. She had another one so I asked her if I could have it and she gave it to me and I broke it in 3 pieces. As soon as I placed the pieces on the floor Lola focused on me and I pointed to the first one. She took it and went into a sit again. I pointed to the second and she took that one, then she automatically took the third one. All I did when she made that mistake was tell her you weren't supposed to steal it. :lol-sign: Then I had another one I gave her but before I did that she stood up on her hind legs and balanced herself taking a few steps. The kids seem to be really impressed when I show them how she gets her treats from the floor.

I guess I'm still confused why you asked if all those things in your other post were abuse? It sounds like your dog is well mannered and the way you describe your training methods sound perfectly gentle and sensible. In other words, it sounds like you know what you're doing....so why would you question whether or not those things are abuse? Do you really not know?

I find most of Lolasdad's post very difficult to understand, so I am with you on your confusion Doberluv.

I shudder to think what would have become of Ben if I had not walked out of my obedience training classes when I did.
Since moving him over to a clicker class his confidence has soared.

He did SO well in class yesterday, he has come leaps and bounds, just tackles the dog walk and A frame as if they were nothing, he has no fear anymore. Why? Because he knows I am there for him, that he can trust me and that he can't get in trouble because he doesn't do anything WRONG persay, just learns as he goes. He has never been punished at agility, never had the word "no" used. And yet, this dog, who has been doing this class for less than 6 months is already ready to enter into a novice course on the 8th!

That, my friends, is what not scaring your dogs does. It is called building a relationship of trust and total team work. I would have it no other way.

I'm so glad you got out of that first class. I remember that, now when you mention it. You have done a super job with Ben...just fantastic. And you nailed it about what a trusting, working relationship, where the dog is a participant does and how to create it. Congrats on your success with Ben. This is very exciting how far he's come in agaility. Way to go!

That's like in my agility class... one of the dogs was afraid to go into the tunnel. The owner asked if he could pull the dog through with the leash.

My instructor about had a heart attack. She was like "NO NO NO NO! The dog is ONLY going to go through the tunnel when she decides that she wants to. I don't care if we're here all day!"
Well about 15 minutes later, the dog went throught the tunnel on her own... and now happily runs at full speed through it! She just needed a little extra time on the first one.

What he should have done is stand at the opposite side of the tunnel the dog was on and coax him or her with a treat whether it be a toy or food but if I was the instructor I would have had him put a collar on and I would have lead him through the tunnel to show that idiot how humiliating it would have been for the dog.

um.... he was on the other side of the tunnel with a treat and calling the dogs name and everything... the dog still didn't want to go through, that's why he asked about the leash.

I was just pointing out how not pushing a dog and letting them overcome their own fears(even though it can take awhile) leaves you with a dog that is now happy to do what you want it to.

And from what I see CM do to dogs, he probably would have been the one to leash the dog and pull it through.

Absolutely. Of what use is a dog that you have to force to do everything?

Lyric was like that when we did agility....at first. I looked like a fool, but I crawled through the tunnel first. LOL. (even though, supposedly, they don't imitate humans very well.) The next thing you know, he's going through. And the next thing you know, it was his favorite obstacle and he'd zoom through it and instead of continuing on the course, he'd make U turn and go through it again, and again. He had everyone in stitches. But he was having the time of his life.That's the most important thing and the thing that makes them go vroom, vroom, as Boemy might put it. LOL. Then the shute was no problem at all. Going blind didn't bother him at all. I miss my Dobe.

Well it's hard to know that seeing as how you left out that important detail no matter how little it was.

I did see one episode of DW where there was a dog that did not want to walk past a garbage can. He would go nuts so what Cesar did was get some garbage cans and put them in two rows close together and got the dog walking right past them. Sometimes I think it's the owner in different situations that make the problem worse as in this case the woman seen the garbage cans and was afraid to have her dog walk past them because she knew the dog was going to freak out. The dog was picking up on her fear.

using a teat is pretty much inferred. in order for the dog to be scared to do something, the dog has to be asked to it. When trying to shape or get a certain behavior luring is pretty much a given. and my post was talking about the dog was not forced to be pulled through the tunnel... that's about it.

I'm not trying to be rude when I ask this, but is english your first language? You're post really are very confusing to read. You jump from topic to topic or seem to almost pull things that border the conversation but aren't really what is being talked about...

Absolutely, that is often the case. And can contribute and add to the fear the dog has. However, over whelming the dog that is going nutso, with rows of several garbage cans so that the dog is forced right past them, flooding him with the object of his fear causes a great risk of learned helplessness...not a good thing. Flooding and force is never the answer when you're talking about a dog who is terrified of something. Now, I've seen my little dog, Jose` occassionally be leery of something up ahead on a walk or hike. Once it was a burned out stump...all black, where everything else in the surroundings didn't look like that. He hesitated to go forward and barked at it. He did not show a high level of anxiety, however. I picked him up in my arms and took him up to it and I touched it. Then he sniffed it and said, "Oh....it's just a hunk of wood." Had he been crouching, backing, trying to escape, I would not have done that. In other words, he had a mild trepidation about the stump, not undue fear.

When something only needs to be gentled along, why use disproportionate force? A little desensatizing would have gotten that garbage can fearing dog right over his fears. It would have taken me about 15 or 20 minutes to convince the dog that the garbage cans (first just one, not a double row of several) are not going to kill him, and in fact, are associated with a very good thing.

LMAO! How many times must you emphasize how good looking Cesar is? Fran is in loooove...

I think it's already well known how I feel about CM. I think he portrays himself in a very, very, very flattering light and he's a marketing genius. He should've just gotten into business and left poor helpless dogs out of it. He is single-handedly taking dog training back 30 years, and being worshipped/idolized for it. Amazing!!!!

Teehee!

I agree Gonzo. He could probably easily get into acting with very little training.... and become a movie star. Why doesn't he try that instead and leave these poor dogs alone?

do you know how I got Ruckus out of chasing cars while on a leash?

I just stopped anticipating it and getting nervous about it. It wasnt the cars he was reacting too most of the time, it was my reaction to the cars that was upsetting him.

to this day, if I tighten a leash around a car... he will lunge at it!

That was the same thing I was talking about earlier with the lady and the garbage cans. It was her reaction causing the problem.

Regardless of the cause or reason for the fear, whether it's coming from a nervous owner or whether it's just the dog's own fear of something, forcing and flooding the dog with the stimulus is NOT the right way to go about getting him over his fear. (unless it's a mild fearful response) That can cause more damage. Desensatizing/counter conditioning is the method which will cause no risk of learned helplessness. What precedes shutting down and dissociating from the stimulus (what Cesar wrongly perceives, is proof the dog is cured) causes a high level of stress and anxiety. It causes a rise in adrenelin and other stress hormones, a rise in blood pressure, heart rate and respiration. Producing anxiety and putting a dog in a chronic state like that is very unhealthy, not only physically, but psycholocially. They do not go through the normal and natural way of accustoming themselves to something they're initially terrified of. In this state, it is difficult, if not impossible for a dog to learn about the fear stimulus. He is in fight or flight, in other words. The cortex (the thinking part of the brain) is not functioning to a sufficient degree when an animal is in fight or flight. To learn to accept the stimuli, he must be in a more relaxed state...hence, desensatizing methods are preferred by experienced trainers and behaviorists.

Did you know that Cesar works with these dogs for hours at a time sometimes days and that what your seeing on TV is only a few minutes of what was actually taped. There is a minimum of 10 hours of tape that is whittled down to 15 minutes of useful footage for the show. So that I am not leaving out any details this was on one of his shows how everything takes hours and what your seeing is a very small part. I'm not defending what he does or doesn't do and I am not saying what he does is right or wrong I am just letting you know that it is Hollywood.

Same goes for Victoria Stlllwell of "It's Me Or The Dog". Recently I had seen her at 2 places. The first was the puppy mill awareness day event and the second was Woofstock in Harrisburg PA. She had a question and answer session and she was talking about one of her episodes where a dog would go nuts every time the couple would get up from the sofa they spent 8 hours just halfway getting up and sitting down again before the dog stopped panicking. What you see on the actual show is a way shortened down version.

And then JQP expects dog trainers to produce results in 20 minutes or less.

I think we all know that. But at least VS actively says changes don't happen fast. TV is all about the fast resolution. The biggest indicator that CM isn't actually promoting dog training but an 'extreme conflict reality show' is the warning not to try this at home. If the purpose was to help people with dogs they would show things people COULD do at home.

Dog training isn't really that tricky or special, but when you want to sell a product you need to convince the buyer its special, rare, essential, etc.