What’s Your Long Term Dog Training Goal?

Recently I’ve seen an increase in the number of enquires from clients who have taken their foot off the gas with their training.

Training a dog is like going to the gym. There’s no point having a massive push in the first four weeks, achieving great results and seeing the benefits, only to slacken off. You can’t then still expect everything to continue to improve or maintain the same. It doesn’t happen.

For any long term goal to be achieved, you can’t become complacent. Whatever your long term dog training goal, you need to be reinforcing the basic commands. More importantly, you need to be consistent.

Too soon to go it alone

A quick example is a Labrador puppy I’ve previously trained. After a few lessons, the owners decided to continue training themselves without first achieving the level I’d be happy to sign off at. Now they have a massive issue with recall – in fact it’s non-existent and a danger to the public and the dog. What if he was to run at the wrong dog and be attacked? More importantly, what if he ran at a person and jumped up,  knocking them to the ground?

If you are committed and determined to work at training your dog or puppy, then great things will be achieved. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither is the obedience in your dogs. I always say I don’t sprinkle any magic fairy dust on my dogs. What I do is to be consistent, structured and disciplined. All my dogs have their own idiosyncrasies which creates their character. They are not robots but what I have is dog that I can enjoy, even with their flaws.

Posted: December 10, 2020