Training Can Be Boring or Rewarding, It's Up To You

I have a client that moved away to Vermont.   Her dog has been unfortunate enough to have been born with some serious physical and medical issues that made themselves known very early on.   So it is important for this client to maintain their (as in the team) training and socialization (safely).

The human client gets bored however.   I totally understand this, much of my training uses silence, calmness, repetitions ET to ready the dog for distractions and temptations of the real world.  "Aha, she said, then you admit that training is boring".  Well, I certainly don't think there is a large television audience ready to watch "real dog training".   It is my job and my client's job to learn to appreciate the dog training process.    This is for the ultimate good of the dog, and to keep the training as gentle and easy as possible, while still training for reliability and results.

So now I will present to you a video of paint drying-----sorry just kidding.   It's even more boring, this is training stays that are in the middle of their development.  What is really exciting is the level of freedom and peace that can come to a dog owner (once the command is usable and/or finished), so that they are more refreshed to do the playing, exercising, and just being with their dogs in general!  So instead of screaming at your dog to get out of the way while cleaning, or hearing them cry crated in the next room, here are some commands and training that can bring just that little bit of peace into your life once finished.  Plus it is so much better for the dog, as they do not need to guess at why you are annoyed with them.   Instead, they have a job to do for a few minutes. Now that is something that I CAN get excited about!

NOTE1:   THIS IS NOT THE BEGINNING POINT OF THE STAY EXERCISE.   IT IS MORE THE LOWER MID POINT OF THIS EXERCISE. BEFORE THIS HAPPENS DOGS NEED TO BE ABLE TO STAY WITH YOU NEAR, STAY WITH YOU NEAR AND MOVING, STAY WITH YOU MOVING AWAY FROM THEM, MEANWHILE YOU ARE ADJUSTING THE TIMES AND DISTRACTION LEVELS.   THEN EVEN BEFORE THIS STAY BEHIND WHILE YOU GO AROUND OR BEHIND SOMETHING. DO NOT START HERE.

NOTE2:  ELECTRONIC COLLARS ARE ON IN THIS TRAINING SESSION, HOWEVER ALL THESE DOGS RESPOND TO BEEPS AND VIBRATE, AND THEREFORE DO NOT NEED THE ELECTRIC STIM.  FOR STAY, I DON'T RELY SO MUCH ON THE COLLAR, I DID VIBRATE A COUPLE OF TIMES FOR THE "LET'S GO" AS THE DOGS WERE RELUCTANT TO GO INTO THE "NEW" ROOM. 



These exercises are all part of daily training that we do.   The stays are related to the obedience training.   Tommy (the brown Pitbull/Lab X) is just doing this to maintain his training while his owners are away.   Magoo is learning to stay in a down when I leave a room.   My dog, Leon, is learning a little self control when I am not working with him right by my side.

You will see later that I switch up the distractions, rooms, and whether or not the dogs are with other dogs or alone in the room.   All these things you change up help train your dog in a more complete way.   Even if your dog does not need to deal with many distractions, they will stronger in their undistracted obedience for learning how to keep a command under distractions.

It won't be boring if you learn how to appreciate what is going on, and live in the moment with your partner.

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