E210: 헤더, 니콜, 크리시 - "운동선수 같은 반려견과 함께 살아가기"

And she's also currently learning that we cannot kill chickens because we just moved. And there's chickens everywhere, like in the streets, walking, roaming around. It was just crazy. So we're talking about that every day. And Nick, basically, like his passion is hurting, but he's a little socially insecure. So he currently just gets used to being in a new space and walking around a new place. And we're just taking it slow so he can adapt. Awesome. So we've got kind of a broad topic today. I wanted to talk about life skills and our sports dogs. So I'd love to kind of have you each share what you see maybe as some of the life skills. It's super important to teach our competition dogs and maybe why you kind of see those skills as important. Heather, do you want to start? The most important thing for me as an individual is teaching my dog how to chill. You know, sports dog versus at-home dog. I want her to be comfortable in any environment. And I want her to be able to transition between environments without this huge swing and arousal level. I want her to be calm when she's and cool and collected when she's hanging out in the car or she's hanging out in the crate. Or if she's just hanging at the confirmation show, you know, maybe lying down at my feet. I want her to be able to chill and just take it all in. And I do a lot of that in the very beginning with my dogs at home. I teach them a lot of chill, do nothing work. It's, you know, people kind of look at me like you teach them to do nothing. And I said, oh, yeah. Because eventually their working life is sort of finished. You know, their dog sport life is finished. And I need that dog to be comfortable in regular everyday life because it's not going to be go, go, go, go, go all the time. And I expect them to be able to handle that transition. And if I can start it right from the square one, then I've got an easy dog that I can take anywhere at any time. Go ahead, Nicole. Along with what Heather said, I'm not very good about teaching my dogs to chill. It took me a while to really figure it out because I just love to work with them so much, especially as puppies. They're these great little sponges that just want to work all the time. So, but yeah, definitely the chill and the station behavior. I found the station behavior to be a life changer. So, I focus a lot on that. And then also just like, I want my dog. I like doing things to my dog. And I want my dog to just be able to hang out, you know, whether that's in public. I want a dog that walks on a loose leash nicely. And, you know, a dog I can just take places. We go hiking a lot.

I love to take the dogs hiking. We go boating a lot. I want a dog that can stay calm in the boat. So, especially with my last couple of dogs, I spent a lot more time working on those types of dogs. And not so worried about the high-level competition skills until some of those life skills are kind of set for that dog. Yeah, I guess for me, it's along similar lines as Heather and Nicole said. My dogs are first and foremost my companions. And it's just my particular lifestyle. I travel and I like taking them places. So, I like them to be able to adapt to new places, to relax in new places. And also, like, off-leash reliability is really important to me, especially here, because I live in Guatemala. And the cultural norm is just for dogs to roam freely and to be off-leash. So, you can't expect other people to have their dogs on a leash. And they will run up to yours. And in general, there are less conflicts when my dogs are also off-leash than if they were on-leash. So, I just put a lot of training, time, and effort into getting reliable recalls around all kinds of things, around other dogs, around those chickens that I just mentioned. One other thing is I also want them to be able to stay home alone. Because I find it really stressful when my dogs are anxious. And since I live alone, I just don't have that luxury that there's always someone home when I have to go out. And I've moved so much in the last couple of years that now, anytime I go to a new place, one of the first things I'll practice is just leaving them for a couple of minutes, pretty much the same day we get there. Because I want them to believe that wherever we are, I'm always going to come back. That's worked quite well, actually, despite COVID and all the working from home. It's an important skill, for sure. So, I know you each have kind of classes coming up on various bits and pieces that kind of tie into that life skills piece, right? So, I wanted to ask you each a little bit about that. So, Chrissy, do you want to talk a little bit about your approach to using less traditional reinforcers for some life skill stuff? I know you've got your reinforcement class coming up. Yeah. So, in this class, we explore all kinds of options that go beyond food or toys. Like your dog's hobbies. I say, like, if your dog had an online dating profile, what would they list as their favorite activities? Some of those things are breed-related, of course, and others are individual. For a border collie, I can use sheep as a reinforcer. For a malinois, I can use, like, biting pretty much anything as a reinforcer.

But you also have individual, like, hobbies, like digging holes in the yard or just swimming, sniffing a particular spot, chasing squirrels. And so, in this class, we talk about how we can use those distractions and turn them into reinforcers. So, once we do that, and if we're able to harness those distractions that are usually annoying to us and use them to our advantage, we practice impulse control at the same time as we're using a really strong reward. We can use whatever the dog likes in a particular situation to reward any life skill or competition behavior we ask them to perform right before we release them to the environment. And once you know how to do that, you've got a really powerful reinforcer at your hand. Oh, and we also talk about things like praise, petting, personal play. Can we use those as reinforcers? Are they actually reinforcing? Does it depend on the dog? So, lots of explorations and rabbit holes to dive down into. Sounds like good nerdy dog training stuff. Oh, yes. Nicole, do you want to chat just a bit about how you approach training stays and using them, you know, in real life situations and not just in competition? Sure. So, I had mentioned stations earlier. Stations are a big part of my stay class. And along with that, the relax down stays. Like, I need a dog that can just go chill out on a station or in a place and truly relax so that I can do other things. So, this comes in handy, like, within a training class if you stop to talk to the instructor, just having a dog that can chill while you do that, rather than running laps with a toy or barking at you constantly to get you to keep working. So, that's a big deal. So, that's a big deal to me. I want the dog to just to be comfortable in the station or just a relaxed down stay. And I train that a lot differently, actually, than I do the competition stays. There's some pretty major differences in what we do there. Because I don't want a dog that's begging to work the entire time they're in a down stay. I want them to really be able to just chill. So, we do that just a little bit differently than the traditional stuff. But also, just, you know, having a good stay when you're out and about. You know, maybe you're hiking on a trail and you need to move off the trail and have the dog stay so someone can go by. You know, stuff like that. So, I think having a dog that can wait and hang out where you leave it for a couple minutes is a really good life skill to have. Absolutely. Heather, do you want to share your approach for teaching dogs how to function in the real world?

I know you kind of mentioned earlier that that's, like, one of the super important pieces for you. Yeah, I mean, I live in the city. I'm not, luckily, I'm not downtown. I don't think I could, I could, I don't know how dogs function downtown. You know, because I don't. But, you know, many people have to live downtown. So, for me, again, part of it is a do-nothing training where the dogs can chill. And when I'm sort of approaching it, if I've got, if I'm dealing with a puppy, it's always done in small little tiny increments. There's no overwhelming. It's not like, okay, I've got to get this dog socialized so I'm going to take them to the farmer's market. No, that's not a good idea, right? You've got to do it in small increments. I'm always looking at the dog and where they are and what they're telling me that they're comfortable with. You've got to keep them under threshold because if you overwhelm them, especially in the city, it's hard to recover from. There's lots of cars whizzing by. There's lots of things happening. There's lots of sounds happening. You know, fireworks in the city, all that kind of stuff that, you know, you just got to do everything in small little increments. And even something as simple as teaching your dog how to get used to their crate, my dogs and their puppies, they get a lot of riding around in the car. So, again, that's do nothing training, riding around in the car. We're doing all our kind of weather permitting, obviously, doing all of our errands. We even go through the car wash, everything. So, they get all these different kinds of sounds. And so, we give little bits and pieces of everything and then gradually increase the intensity of them as they get older. And they show that they're able to handle that kind of thing. And to date, I've never had a dog be fearful of fireworks or, you know, thunder or anything like that. I had my old dog who was long gone. She used to be. But then we got through that. And as she got older, she was more and more comfortable with it. But she sort of came with a history of being afraid of sounds. So, but again, it's a lot of it is the do nothing training, as everybody else is saying, you know, teaching the dog to chill. And then doing everything in small little increments. And just taking it slow for the individual dog. Taking a look at them, who they are as individuals. Not to what everybody says you have to do with a dog by a certain time. Mm-hmm. So, I wanted to, just kind of a little bit of a shift.

But talk about how you each kind of balance, you know, working on the specific fancy skills or the fun skills for sports stuff with the kind of super important life skills training. And just how you kind of approach that with your own training to make sure you're getting in both pieces and doing what you need to do. Nicole, do you want to start this one? Sure. Sure. So, I'm always fascinated by the sexy stuff, you know. But I love training all that. Thanks, Shade. And I love training it. And I really enjoy, especially the younger dogs teaching and that stuff. But what I have found, thank you, Excel. He's been a great teacher. The life skills is really, really important. And if you have that stuff down, if you take the time to train it when they're younger, it just makes your life so much easier. And Excel has his challenges. He has some over-arousal issues. Some frustration issues. You know, really, really almost hyper-social. And he's really taught me that you got to get the life skills figured out, you know. Walking on a loose leash in the presence of other people or dogs. That was really tough for him. Doing a down stay in any type of, oh, my goodness. Like, agility, he loses his brain. You know, it took me, like, three years to teach him a down stay and agility. There are dogs doing agility and he has to go do it. So, he's really taught me a lot. So, he's really the first dog with whom I have focused on life skills as a puppy. Like, we did a lot of foundation stuff like toy play and reinforcement strategies and such. But I didn't really do a ton of actual behaviors with him until he was a little bit older. Because we just had to deal with this other stuff first. And in hindsight, I love it. He's so easy now. I mean, I shouldn't say it's easy because you still have these challenges. But it is. It's so much easier to just take him places and to have those foundations in place. And it makes training the sexy stuff so much easier when you've got that great foundation. So, I would definitely be much more inclined to do it more that way with my next dog. With Excel, it was more of a necessity because I could not take, you know, the monster into public for a while until I taught him these things. So, it was definitely in this necessity with him. But it was very advantageous for us to be able to get that stuff down so that everything else is just more enjoyable and easier to teach. Heather? I mean, life skills is 24-7 in our house. Because when my dogs are sort of, you know, classified as finished, they're sort of working like they're seniors and stuff. My husband gets them.

So, they become like his shadow, you know, versus mine. Not to say that I'm not, you know, important. I'm still, as soon as I walk through the door, it's like all focus goes to me and he's kind of left in the shadows. But he, you know, he will then take them for, you know, running errands if I'm out doing something else and so forth. But so, the life skills definitely, just as Nicole said and Chrissy says, for me, they're 24-7. And when it comes to the dog sports, that is like a time-specific schedule. So, there's a certain amount of time, you know, you log off for doing your dog sports. And then you, but everything else, your life skills and what you require as a dog at home is 24-7. And, but what I do in that, I don't really, I guess I don't really segregate life skills and dog sports skills so much as what I do is I try to find skills that have dual purposes. So, for instance, when I'm teaching a life skill of like stand still, I need to brush you or I need, you know, the vet needs to take a look. That is trained to the level that I would need for stand for exam or that I would need in the confirmation ring. So, when I'm teaching this stuff, it's still a life skill, but I'm teaching it to the next level. And then I find that way when I have to fine-tune my, come to do my dog sports stuff, it's just a little bit of tweaking. There's not a whole lot of work that has to be done. And then when you turn it back down, when the dogs are retired, they've got those life skills. So, they've always got something to draw upon that they have a reference point on. And that gives them that ease of transition in going from, you know, being that couch potato that, okay, yeah, mom's taking me now in the van and we're going to go and do something to like, okay, I'm going to have that dog sport come back. Okay, now I'm a couch potato again. It allows them to make those transitions because all of those skills that I taught as life skills, they're nothing brand new to them. Chrissy, do you want to give your take? Well, for me, like the sexy stuff is the life skills. And I think that's just because mostly because of my personality. I'm just not a competitive person. I like, like I enjoy training the sports skills because it's a challenge for me to become a better trainer. And I really enjoy that journey of figuring out, oh, like how do I teach that perfect heel position? How do I get that great alert that I'm looking for? Like I like being that person who takes her dogs everywhere. And I like it when people are like looking at me and complimenting me on my dogs in public.

Like that's my biggest reinforcer. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I can see that. You know, it's the same thing for me. Oh, your dogs are so well behaved. You don't know the work that went into it. Right. And I do also like I like challenging myself. Like for a while I didn't have a car. I used game to like to bike touring as I was carrying a backpack of groceries up the mountain I used to live on. Or sometimes I had her carry her my groceries in her dog backpack. But I can't take her in the grocery store. So I have a friend who has a hair salon. She let me park my dog while I went to get the groceries. Teaching her to be able to relax in a corner while my friend's clients came and went. That was really like that was that is really cool. And then having that and like dropping her off there and my friend being happy to see her and like certain clients recognizing her and knowing her. And it's this well behaved dog who just hangs out in the corner and observes the world. That is like I love doing that. Yeah, that's gold. That's gold. And of course, you have to have a dog also who does bring the baseline personality to the table. For example, Mick, he I got him as an adult. And he grew up on a farm. He probably didn't really leave the farm that much and didn't see that many people. He's struggling with that now. Like I got him specifically for herding when I lived on my little mountain, which was very similar to the farm. But now we're basically in the center of another small town. And it's really hard for him because he didn't learn these things ever. I mean, from the time I had him, I would take him into town like once a week, just taking it slow, getting him used to things. But now being immersed in that on a daily basis, he is really struggling and I am struggling watching him struggle. So that is just also like a good reminder for me how important it is because we don't know if our life circumstances are going to change. It's just really good to have dogs who know how to be around people and how to adapt to different places. It's just like even if you don't plan. I wasn't planning on leaving my socially distant, pretty perfect mountain. But my rental contract didn't get extended. So I had to. Kind of makes you appreciate what, you know, where the dogs are and how, you know, how we need to support them in the different environments. And do take it slowly for them so that they can feel comfortable and grow and then be that flexible later on.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's also it was I was just smiling when you talked about really focusing on the individual dog in your class and taking it at their speed because that's what I'm doing. And it's nice. It's always nice to have that confirmed because sometimes I feel like, well, I mean, that's that's really slow progress. That's just what he needs. Right. Sometimes the Internet is good. Sometimes it's not so good. And it fills people's heads with a lot of things like you got to know if your puppy's shy, get them out more. No, you got to wait a little bit. Let your puppy come around and just gradually give them a little bit more. And sure enough, I mean, you know, my my students that I have in my in in person, you know, the puppy comes in really shy and and and reticent to do anything the first week, maybe the second week, depending on the puppy. But generally, by the third week, they're out there and they're like, OK, I got this confident I can do this. And it's because we're taking it slow. You know, we're taking it. We're not overwhelming them. We're not asking them to do a whole bunch of things. We're just just in some instances, I've even had the puppies just sit in the owner's lap and watch the class. Right. And that's all it takes for the puppies just to figure out what's going on in the world. Yeah. And the relationship improves as they're doing this, as they're learning, oh, that that lap, that's a safe space for me. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So this next one, Heather, I think you started to actually get into this a little bit with your answer on the last question, which is I'd like to talk a little bit how, you know, having good life skills and spending the time and investing in those skills can really complement the training that we then go on to do for our chosen dog sports. And you were talking before about, you know, how when you train for some of your cooperative care stuff, you train it to the level for stand for exam or for confirmation. So do you want to take this one first and talk a little bit more about just kind of how some of your life skills complement your sports training? Sure. I mean, like I said, and, you know, like all of us have reiterated this, I want a dog that can move through the different environments and not think anything of it. I don't want a dog that, God, you know, you go to the agility field and sorry, Nicole, and the dog literally loses its marbles. Yeah, but you know what I mean, you've worked through it, Nicole, you know what it's like, I don't, I don't want, I don't want that it's hard on the dog.

It's hard on the people around you, or the other dogs around you. It's hard, you know, like I, I travel with my dogs. So my dogs go on airplanes, and they go into hotels, and they go all over the place seminars in there. So I might be say, you know, like something at either, you know, our Fensi camp or, you know, Clicker Expo, and the dogs are there. And I need them to be able to, to chill, and to accept all the people and all the excitement and not just see it and go, I'm in Disneyland, I can do anything I want, right? It's like, no, there are rules, the rules apply, no matter where you are. So, you know, by being able to move through the different environments, and move through the different levels of excitement and work, I guess, workability is what I'm saying, is that, you know, if we're out on the trails and hiking, yeah, you can go like a bat out of hell and have some fun and go sniffing in the bush, do all that kind of stuff. We're on the streets, and we're running errands, I need you to stick with me, and not pulling me to all over the place to sniff on the street and knocking people over, right? So, you know, what goes, you know, when I need you to behave, I need you to behave. When I need you to have some fun, go at it and have some fun. So, that's kind of what I'm, I'm looking at for the compliments. So, I guess if I'm, I'm sort of, I just want a well-balanced dog. Don't we all? Yeah, don't we all, yeah. You know, but I've, I've seen the dogs. I said, I won, one day I went into the fly ball barn. I, I walked in, I heard the noise, and I walked right back out. I couldn't take it. And, you know, and, and it's just like, there was no way I could, I couldn't do that sport. You know, I admire you if you got, if your eardrums will take that kind of stuff, but mine won't. And, and it's like, no way, I can't do that, you know, and I don't want to have my dog, you know, at a function where I can't leave them in their crate and they're yapping, yapping, yapping, yapping, yapping, yapping, and stressing and so forth. It's like, even at the confirmation shows, right? You see the noise at the confirmation show sometimes can be really bad. And that stresses the dogs up. They don't show well. They don't perform well. They don't pay attention, you know, and so then they're not being their best. And I want the dogs comfortable and feeling that, oh yeah, yeah, that, that idiot over there is being in a jerk in his crate, but doesn't, doesn't affect me, doesn't bother me. That's my transitioning stuff. Chrissy, do you want to talk a little bit about that? Oh, yeah. Yeah.

So I guess for me, it's really like the reliability I get around distractions. That's gold. Such as, for example, the, the, the chicken challenge that we currently working on. So Mick doesn't care about chickens. He, his herding instinct only kicks in around sheep. So that's great. But game, I mean, you know, she would like to take a bite there. And, and those things, those chickens, they're just walking like basically right under your feet. Sometimes it's like a really small town. There are hardly any cars, only tuk-tuks and very narrow streets. Everyone has their own chickens. They're everywhere. And I want her to be off leash around these chickens without having to worry that she's going to eat one or bring one home for dinner. Not when she's with me and people are watching. I mean, you got to wonder if those chickens don't have a death wish, right? It's just like. So tempt you, tempt you. I mean, I'm assuming they're like the average lifestyle of a chicken must be relatively low here. Because there are tuk-tuks and there are free roaming dogs. I mean, yeah. But I don't want to lower it any further. So I'm like working on impulse control. I'm working on recalls around them. I'm working on walking on a loose leash. I'm working on focusing on me. And when I have that with like chickens trying to step into her mouth, I mean, then she can do anything. I love that. I love the picture there of like the chicken literally coming up to her. Because I'm sure for them, like they don't know that this dog isn't the dog that they can just walk parade pass and through. Exactly. And most dogs who are roaming freely are like good around these animals because if they're not, they will get called. I mean, it's a different culture. And the owner of those chickens, if they see the same dog killing one of their chickens three times in a row, I mean, there won't be a fourth time. A really good strong leave it is in the works. What about you, Nicole? Well, how do you or how do you kind of see life skills complementing your sports skills? Well, first, I want to say, Chrissy, I get it because we have chickens. And the worst part is our chickens are like our pets. So like my kids are really attached to these chickens. And Excel at three and a half is just getting to the point where I'll go train them in the backyard around the chickens. It took that long to really trust that he wasn't going to go chase down a chicken and bring it back to me. So I totally get it. It's tough. Chickens, yeah, they can be kind of stupid. We have guineas too, and they're worse.

I don't know if you have any guineas, but they're much worse than chickens. So anyway, Melissa, back to the question. And so I'd spend a lot in a normal year. Obviously, this last year doesn't count. But in a normal year, I spend a lot of weekends on the road with my dogs. I travel by myself. I typically have generally two dogs, but sometimes three. I stay in hotels. We spend the day crated at a dog show, whether it's agility or obedience. There is a lot of walking in and out of that environment to potty dogs, exercise dogs, that sort of stuff. So I need a dog that travels well. I need to be able to walk two to three dogs at the same time all on a loose leash. I need a dog that can hang out in his crate and rest in there and to be comfortable in there so that he can be his best or she can be her best when I pull him out of the crate to warm up. If they were constantly scanning their environments and if they were freaking out in their kennel, obviously that would not be conducive to a good performance in the ring. So all of this stuff is critical. I don't just, you know, it's not just about the six minutes in the utility ring or open ring or novice ring. It's about how they do getting in and how well they relax and can they stay in a hotel without losing it every time someone walks by. All that stuff is really important because I do this with my dogs for a lot of reasons, but one of them is I love being with my dogs. I love the training that goes into it and then being able to kind of see how that transfers over to the show ring, the performance ring. And I do this because I enjoy it. But if I had a dog that dragged me all over the place or that shrieked in the kennel or barked every time somebody walked by in the hotel room, that wouldn't be very enjoyable for me. So that's all that stuff is really important. It's definitely equally as important as all the fun stuff, you know, the utility articles and go outs and that stuff is fun. But the other, the life skill stuff is definitely really important so that I can enjoy the dog sports competition skills. So we've talked a bunch about what you guys kind of like to train and the good stuff. So I also want to know what you think is hard to train. You know, what life skill do you think is kind of the most difficult one to teach? And how do you approach actually teaching your dogs that skill? Chrissy, do you want to go first on this one? I think that really depends on the individual dog. So for Mick, for example, the most difficult thing is just being able to let down his guard and relax around strangers. That's probably partly the breed.

Border collies are just, they notice everything. They notice changes in the environment. But it's also, of course, having grown up, not being exposed to these things. So for him, the individual that he is, this is the biggest challenge he's currently facing. I mean, for Malinois, it's just being, realizing that out in public, we do not have to defend Chrissy. Everything's fine. I approach that as a, as a confident thing. And in game, I definitely see that the more confidence I build up in her, the more she feels like she can handle anything. And the world is a safe space. The less she feels like she has to take socially inappropriate actions. And that is something my other Malinois grit really struggled with because she saw a threat in, in everything. Well, not in everything, but she, what was okay in her worldview was much more narrow. So that made it harder for her to brace herself and let me take care of things. So for her, the way I approached that was just really clear leadership, letting her know that I'm the one who's handling these things. Nothing bad is going to happen. You don't have to step up and take the lead and scare away the weird guy with the large sombrero. So really depending on the dog and what they bring to the table, the approach that I take will differ. And also the challenge differs. For example, what Nicole mentioned, that's like the, the stereotypical golden retriever. One of their biggest challenges is probably going to be not jumping up on everyone and not saying hi to everyone and just containing their excitement, their excitement and their happiness. They're not very good at containing that. That's hard. Right. I'm like, and I like, I know people like that. It's like, I often think that when I see a golden, who's just so excited to be here, I think of some of my friends. I'm like, yeah, you're like totally that person. And, and, and my dogs don't, they don't really struggle with that because they don't have that extreme sociability. And very, like lots of my clients have very independent dogs, either independent breeds or locally. It's people who adopt free roaming dogs and turn them into pets. And those dogs, they have a very high independent streak and very opportunistic often. So it is hard to get off leash reliability, for example, because you really have to make it worth their while. They don't see the point. While my dogs are very biddable, they just come with this hardwired will to please me, which makes many things much easier. And for those independent dogs, I really like using those non-typical reinforcers.

So anytime it's possible, I like training, turning the environment or the distraction that they would rather have into the reward for doing what I ask of them. And that really, it strengthens the relationship. And it also is a loophole to get reliability with highly independent dogs. Yeah, actually, Chris, you made a good point there, too, of the independence within certain breed types. So, you know, for instance, so you're, you know, like your bird dogs, very independent. You know, herding dogs, very handler focused, but also very aware of their environment and different types of dogs. And that, you know, people forget sometimes that they're, you know, you got to, you got to, if you've got a dog that's very, a breed that's very independent worker, then you've got to focus really highly on building that bond right in the very beginning so that the dog is starting to pay attention a little bit more to you. So you've got that bond to, that the dog starts to look to you versus like, okay, yeah, we're out here. Oh, I see a bird, I'm gone, right? So, yeah, that comes back to recalls and everything else. But you're still working against a breed propensity to head out. Same like huskies and, you know, they're bred to run. They're gone. So, you know, you, you got to get, got to get the foundations in very quickly and that bonding in very quickly and heavily when they're, when they're puppies. What do you think, Nicole? Yeah, I totally agree, Heather. I, I recently recorded my sporting dog webinar. And the big purpose of that webinar was to help show people kind of what these dogs' natural instincts are and how that can be both helpful and harmful for people for particular, particularly with performance. And kind of teaching the people, okay, how do we make this a little bit easier? And it really does come down to that early training and the early puppy stuff and what you, what you tend to focus on. As Chrissy mentioned, you know, yeah, golden retrievers, very, very, very social, definitely one of our biggest challenges. Although I've had goldens that like, they love, they're fine, they don't care, but they just like Toby, he just wanted to work. I said he was not a golden retriever until he was like 10 years old because he never would notice other people. It was all me. So, which came with its own challenges when it came to agility, because it was still all about me. So we had to work through that. But I really agree with Chrissy that it's, you know, the difficult stuff, it just really depends on the dog. And sometimes there's a lot of difficult stuff.

Like for Excel, it was a lot of stuff because he was so environmental. And so we had to work through so much. But then once we started working and addressing the arousal thing, then everything got so much easier. So the, the wanting to go greet other dogs and kind of barking and whining and frustration and the inability to just do a down stay when there's exciting things going on. Um, I remember going to the dock diving trials. And I would walk in with my, I had my treat and train and my station and people would look at me like, what are you doing? And I put the station down, like by the pool and I put the man, the treat and train on there. And, you know, I would like dispense treats like every half a second for like, you know, a period of time. And, um, people, yeah, they totally didn't get it. Cause it kind of like a fly ball, those people, like they like the loud and the really crazy. And I don't, I need a dog that can think and doesn't have his brain falling out of his ears. Cause he tends to do that anyway. So he doesn't need any more help. That was tough though. Getting a dog that can walk up the dock on a loose leash. That was probably the toughest thing I've ever done. And for a while, for a while it was, Ooh, let's just play the get it game where I'm just going to toss treats on the ground all the way to the dock. And then I'm just going to lock over the leash and let him run up there. So we don't have a fight about it, but that was important to me. That was something that I needed a dog that could focus and that could bring his arousal level down, um, in a situation where it was almost impossible, but we really made a lot of progress. So it really does depend on the dog. Some dogs, it's the other people that are going to be really tough and teaching them to be calm around other people. Some dogs, it's going to be the down stay or the relaxed stuff, or they're really going to struggle. Um, so yeah, yeah, that's kind of, kind of my answer. A little bit of everything. Well, you actually made a good point there with, um, you know, losing his head around the dock and so forth. Cause that can also be, if you've got a dog that is so out there in their arousal level, they can injure themselves quite badly just by being jerky like that. Because, you know, and that's why, you know, I, I need you thinking about what you're doing with your body and, and, you know, your brain is in check with your body and your body's in check with your brain so that we don't have an accident. Um, you know, at least you're trying to avoid it the best you can, but I mean, things happen.

Um, and if you've got a dog that is supposedly in drive, um, which is a thing that, that you can have a high drive dog, but that dog may not be focused and it's more a frenzy than it is, is focused. And that's dangerous. Yeah, I totally agree. And that's why I spend so much time with Excel, you know, cause like, I don't want that level of arousal. Like, that's not good for anybody. I need them to be a little more thoughtful. Um, you know, even like with agility, they can very easily get themselves hurt in agility if they're just throwing themselves at everything and not being thoughtful. And it's really hard in obedience when they get that way, because they stop thinking, you know, like you have to think when you're doing obedience and you have to think about how to do straight fronts and healing and all that stuff. So, yeah, I definitely agree, Heather, that I don't think that level of arousal is good for, for the dog at all. And I guess when it comes down to it, like for, for me, the life skill, if you go back to the life skills and the difficult thing to train, um, for me, it's, it's, it's not difficult, but I think if I'm teaching it for other people to learn is loose leash walking. I don't know why, but it is so hard for people to get loose leash walking. And I mean, I know why I know part of it is, is it comes down to consistency. Right. Um, but loose leash walking is probably one of the hardest, but it's also sort of one of the most important things to teach. Um, aside from, you know, the recall, because if you can't walk the dog, if it's not comfortable to walk your dog in an area, around your, your environment, uh, or wherever it is that you go and it's a pain in the butt, your dog is, you know, dragging you everywhere and, you know, jumping out at that person going by and jumping out at that dog going by and it's just like losing their marbles. It's hard on your human body. And as a result, um, it's not fun to walk the dog. Nobody wants to walk the dog. It gets passed along and passed along and passed along. And then they end up being stuck in the backyard. And then, you know, that's where you, you can spiral down and the dogs don't have a very good life that way. So for me, I want it to be enjoyable for the dogs to get out and for the people to take them out. Um, and the way to do that is with good loosely walking skills, because then whether you're doing, um, you know, you're doing your regular everyday living or whether or not you're doing dog sports, it's still a pleasure having your dog with you. And as you're moving through all these different environments.

So that's my take on it. So everybody kind of feels that, um, for the last question that we kind of had to tell her to the dog. And I want to kind of flip that in its head and think about also kind of how, you know, different rules are important for different people. And kind of talk about that maybe a little bit. I know, for example, um, you know, one of my boyfriend's big rules is that the dogs cannot be underfoot in the kitchen. Right. So we've worked really hard to create stationing behaviors in the kitchen. Um, but for some people, like it's a big deal. They don't want their pets on the furniture. I don't care if my dogs are on the furniture. They are more than happy to be on the couch. Right. Um, so I don't put any effort or time into training them to stay off of it. Do any of you have things that you can share that maybe are important to you, but aren't usually important to other people or in the reverse that, you know, maybe you're really important to other people that you don't really care about with your own dogs. Nicole. Yeah. So like the furniture thing doesn't bother me at all. My dogs are on the furniture. They're on my lap. Sometimes they're on the bed. Um, but they're respectful about it. You know, they're not, well, I don't know that I call Excel respectful as he like slithers up my body to cuddle at night, but you know, he does kind of ask permission by staring at me with his cute eyes. And then I'm like, okay, buddy, come on on. Um, so the, the furniture thing, um, it's, it's kind of funny how, like, I, I too do not like my dogs in the kitchen. Cause every time I turn around and tripping over them, but with my old guy, like I've been letting him come in the kitchen because he like gets all excited about the food. And so, you know, I, I'm having to watch and not trip over him, but, um, the rules are always different with the older ones too. So, um, definitely staying out of the kitchen. I actually teach my dogs just to cue. That means leave the room, go through a threshold. I don't care which one, I don't care where you go, just go find a threshold and go through it. So I use that a lot in the kitchen. Um, well actually in any room where I just need them to, to go away for a moment. Um, but yeah, so dogs in the furniture don't bother me, but like a recall is absolutely, I need a recall. I need loose leash walking, you know, I need a good, great behavior. So that stuff is really important to me. But in terms of like, um, you know, stuff in the house, like my dogs, they just kind of do their own thing.

And, you know, they, they, they come on the furniture and, and they follow me around cause they're golden retrievers. So they're always within six feet of me. Even when I'm going to the bathroom, I know they're right outside that door. So, um, so yeah, that, you know, that kind of stuff that doesn't bother me like it would with some people. Yeah. Um, same thing out of the kitchen. Cause I don't want to turn around with a hot pot of whatever and fall over you. Um, and I've, uh, what I've done is created the, in our house, we have like a bit of a natural barrier with the carpet. So that's the, that's the edge of the kitchen, um, area. So because I actually feed there, that's where they kind of hang out. And that's where they've been told to hang out, um, during cooking time. If it's not cooking time, then they're free. They have to pass through the kitchen to get into the mudroom and to go outside and different things. So they can wander through. But as a result of stationing them there, um, and, and reinforcing them for hanging out at the edge, um, you know, I don't, I don't have to worry about a whole lot of stuff. They naturally just gravitate there. Um, furniture. I don't care about the furniture you can come up, but you can't just launch yourself into my lap in the process, right? No, I don't want, you know, an 80 pound dog stepping on me. You got to have boundaries. So for, and I, this is something I never, I never really taught the dogs, but they, we just kind of, it just kind of happened by osmosis and all the dogs kind of learned the rules, I guess, from each other. And in our family room, we have to have two couches. So, um, the humans sit generally at one end of the couch and the dog sits at the other. And even when we are not on the couch, the dogs still take their place. They don't stretch out further on the couch and they don't deviate from that position on the couch. So I don't have a problem with that. They're allowed up on the bed. And I tell people, you know, in my, uh, students in my, in my in-person classes and everything is that your dog can be on the furniture. If that's what you want, your dog can be on the bed. If that's what you want. If you've got problems, if your dog growls at you or your dog, you know, won't let your husband in the, in the room, then you gotta, you gotta, just another problem happening and you gotta deal with it. So do what works for your, your, your household, um, and, and how that works. But, and again, like Nicole said, loose leash walking is a must. Um, I've had a number of car accidents. I have a bad back.

I've had my old dogs that I'm even currently now lifting. You know, I'm lifting 70 pounds daily, three, four, five, six times a day. Um, and so my shoulder and everything is getting shot. I don't need to be, you know, um, split in two because I'm going one way and the dog's going another way. Um, I need you here with me. So loose leash walking is it. And as well, a recall, because that's, that's one of the first things I try and teach because that's a life-saving behavior. And that's one that is always rewarded no matter what. Even if you were, I got, you got caught digging in my garden and I call you and you come, you get a cookie for coming, right? It's just dirt. And I can put that plant back in there later, right? But I'm going to pay out for that recall because I might need it next time. And it's going to be really, really important. And I want you to not think twice about coming. So, you know, those are the things that I don't think there isn't anything that I don't really bother about. Um, I'm just trying to think. Like, I suppose if there was one thing is maybe it would be, um, not to alert bark on the neighbor's truck every time you see it there. It's there all the time. Do you have German Shepherds, Heather? Do you have German Shepherds? I know. I know. It's just like, it's Eric's truck. It's always there. But then last time, mom, it wasn't there. But now it's there. So it's like, yeah, it's just, we're going to have to do some work on this truck because the neighbors, she's fine with and everything, but it's that black truck. I guess it looks like some kind of an animal or something through the fence. I don't know. But that's the only thing. And I haven't bothered with that yet. So I think I might have to. Fair enough. Chrissy? I think, yeah, I guess off leash reliability is something I take to a bigger extent or to a greater extent than most people. And I have my dogs off leash in places where other people probably wouldn't do that. I mean, the furniture thing, yes, I'm with you all there. They're all welcome on the furniture. I guess I also, when I have social dogs, when someone comes over, for example, Game thinks everyone comes because they're visiting her. And Phoebe used to think that too. And I really don't mind, you know. If I know the person coming over is someone who, like, is into dogs and likes excited greeting, then I let them greet that person. You know, they get to jump up on that person. And if I know both my dogs like that and the person likes that.

And if it's not a dog person who's visiting, then I'll just put my dogs in a different room or leave them in the yard or create them for a little bit. But when dog people come over, they can be the wild, crazy children. I don't mind that at all. Yeah. And also things like leaving things on the kitchen counter. I feel that's my responsibility. Like, when we're out in public, my dogs are expected to not eat that kid's ice cream cone, for example. When we're home, like, at their house too, they get to move around freely. And if I make the mistake of leaving roast beef on the kitchen counter, well, serves me right if it's gone by the time I'm back. Like, things like that, I just, you know, if I have a phone ready, I will, like, take a picture of my dog being naughty and laugh about it. And those are things that are really important to many of my clients. So I know how to train them. But I personally just don't really mind. It's easier to manage. Yeah. Yeah. But, I mean, also, like, if I have, if I had a partner who felt strongly about that, like you said, with your boyfriend, I mean, sure. Why not? We can have rules that make everyone happy. All right, guys. So I've got one question left here for you. So it's the one I usually kind of ran out the podcast with, which is, can you share something that you've each either learned recently or maybe been reminded of recently when it comes to dog training? And bonus points for you guys if it's tied into life skills stuff. Heather, do you want to start us out? Oh, gosh. What have I learned lately? Squirrels are a pain in the butt. That's a good thing to learn. No, and actually, I'm having to now really sort of work on it and being more consistent. But squirrels aside, I think for me, being reminded of it is being consistent. And that comes back to, again, what I was saying about loose leash walking and rewarding recalls and so forth, is you can't keep changing the rules on the dog. So using the loose leash walking example is that sometimes the dog gets to pull to mom or to dad or to the kids or whatever. And then sometimes the dog is told, no, you can't pull to the kids or the dogs. Or, you know, sometimes you don't want to be dragged to the trailhead before you head out. And then, you know, you let the dog drag you the next day. I mean, that's inconsistency. I think it's not good for the dog. It's not good for you. And it's not good for the overall training. So for me, it's like being clear and consistent. Don't change the rules. It's kind of like the same thing when you're working stays. You know, some people will say, okay, go, stay.

And then they'll go down, they'll sit down for dinner, and the dog will get up and start wandering away. You know, if you're going to ask the dog to do something, then pay attention and be consistent and help them be successful. And, like I said, work at the level of the dog. You know, don't take them beyond. Like, don't give them their learner's license. You know, take them down the alley and say, okay, now let's go on the freeway. It's no good things are going to happen at that point. So do everything in small little increments and graduate and, you know, only move forward on when your dog is consistently successful. Because if you go, you know, you start with the ABCs and then you want that dog to write that thesis, but you haven't got, you know, taught them how to make a sentence or make a word even, then it's still not going to, you know, it's the same analogy. It's still not going to work. You're going to burn and crash because you're putting the dog over their capabilities. So it's work to the level of the dog, be consistent, and move forward on your successes. Excellent. There, you got it. Nicole? So yesterday I went down for a private lesson. I am lucky enough to get to train with Nancy Little in person every month. So I'm about like three hours and 45 minutes from her. So monthly I go down there and I train with her for a couple hours. And we, um, Excel has a pretty good station behavior, but we haven't done much training lately. Um, I no longer have my dog training building. And last month I wasn't able to go down to see Nancy. So the dogs are kind of, we've had a lot going on and they haven't had as much training as they'd like. Um, so Excel was pretty pushy yesterday and I kept putting him on the station and he would like, just stare at me. And then he'd like to take one foot and put it off and look at me. And then he'd take two feet and put it off. And I was getting a little frustrated because normally he's really good, but he would just kind of be in a sneaker, a stinker. And, um, so what Nancy did, I thought this is awesome. So she took, um, she has like these stackable stations. So she stacked these things up. They're like, um, they were, they're cots for kids at daycare. And I'm, I'm totally going to Google it and see if I can find some, but she stacked them up. So they were probably, I don't know, two and a half feet off the ground, something like that. And by just changing that, by making it more difficult for Excel, much more effort for Excel to take off his front feet.

I mean, you could see like he would, he would stand at the edge and then he'd like lean over and he'd almost fall off, but he's like, dang it, I can't get my foot down there. So then he would just stop trying. It was great. And it just, you know, sometimes you can tweak something and sometimes you can bring in a little extra management, um, where you're not like having to spend six months on a training plan. But like that simple change by making it more difficult for his front feet to come off made the world of difference. And I didn't think of it cause I was in the situation. I was a little bit frustrated. I'm like, why aren't you just staying? I don't understand. And Nancy puts these little stackable things up and it was great because he did wonderfully. He did not once try to come off that. So that really struck me that sometimes the answer isn't necessarily more training. The dog has had tons of training on stations. He's very well trained, but sometimes the answer is just tweaking the environment to help the dog, to help set the dog up for success and to help the dog be successful. So that was a really good reminder for me yesterday. Um, and I thought it'd be a good example to share with you guys. I like that. Yeah, I, I, I do too. And actually you just sort of reminded me as well that I was being a pill with my dog the other day, because sometimes when I take her to, I've got this one class where it's kind of like a, it's a, it's kind of a free for all. Um, not, not, not in that way, but it's just like, we're, we're, we're working on different team exercises. Anyways, long story short is that she has to station while I show somebody else what to do. And normally she's really good. And she just lies there and she just chills and she watches. But lately, um, she's been kind of, she stands up and she starts to bark and I'm going like, holy cow, what's this? I don't want this. So I would just tell her to lie down. Quiet. And it was getting to be like, you know, a really back and forth tug of war. So then I I'm just thinking now is I should have gone, I should have been going back and rewarding her for staying there when she was quiet and, you know, helping her be quiet. And he just reminded me of that, Nicole. And that's normally what I do, but I hadn't, I'd skipped that for a bit. And I was, I was frustrating her and I was frustrating myself. And that's bad on me. I should have just tweaked the environment and set her up and been rewarding her for doing the right thing rather than, you know, turning around saying, okay, lie down, shut up. You know, like I, I need you to be quiet.

It'll be your turn in a second. But part of it is too, you know, she's, she's on some medication, which is making her super hungry. So she's saying like, forget it. Don't give those dogs that cookie. I want it. I want to work because I know I can get cookies from you. So there's a whole bunch of things going around, but you're right. It means paying attention and just tweaking something within the environment because she had the training. It was just something that was off, but I didn't see it. So thanks for reminding me on that one. All right, Christy, you want to give it a try? Okay. So I feel like I've learned so much lately. I'm writing a novel and it wasn't going to be a dog training novel at all, but that's what it's turning into. It's about human connections and all the things that get in the way of them. And it ended up being set in the dog training world. And I have these different focus characters. So different characters and the reader sees the world through their eyes. And they're all very different people and have come from different places and have different philosophies. And I wanted to be a book where as a reader, you like all the characters. So I have to do some research. I have a character who's a balance trainer and that's not my niche. My niche is mostly positive reinforcement focused life skills and pet dog solutions. And I guess over the last decade, I've learned from so many great positive reinforcement trainers. But the also excellent balance trainers out there, they just haven't been on my radar at all. And now that I'm immersing myself into their philosophies and their training solutions, because I want to learn so I can write this character, I'm learning so many new things that I had never even that I would never have thought of. And I'm really enjoying it. I just really wish and that it's been such a great reminder that I wish there was less tribalism and campism in the dog training world. Because it's really we could all learn so much from each other. If we just talk to each other more and left our prejudices at the table. Yeah, because I can talk to you and learn how you would solve a certain problem. And I don't have to then embrace that solution. I can still learn about it and take what works for me and leave what doesn't. And I feel like we really we tend to forget about that. We tend to just be so focused on our own solutions. Yeah. Yeah. And that brings up the point of, you know, individual dog owners, you know, guardians, if you want to call them that. You know, everybody has different needs and wants for whatever it is that they're doing with their dog.

And, you know, if you've got, you know, clients that are in condos, their needs and wants are going to be way different than somebody who's got a house in the backyard. Or, you know, what's going to work for somebody is not going to work for somebody else. There's sure there's the tried and true methods of doing everything. But you always have to think outside of the box because you're dealing with individual dogs, individual people. And so you have to make those adjustments. And just like, you know, what you're saying, Chrissy, is like different points of view, you know, different results. And you take what you can and use it and turn it around. But sort of also, too, is it, you know, just because if somebody doesn't mind their dog jumping up on them, then that's fine. But if they don't want their dog to jump up on other people, then they have to understand that they have to realize they still have to teach the dog not to jump up and then just give the dog a cue to jump up on them. You know, if that's what, you know, to make it work, right? If they still want that interaction with their dog, you still have to teach the dog not to jump, but then teach them a jump cue, right? So you got to give people sort of what works for them and will make their relationship better. Yeah. Awesome. All right. Thanks to all of you for participating today, for chatting about this stuff. I think it was great. So thank you for coming on the podcast. You're welcome. This was fun. I get to see you guys and get to talk to you. Yeah, it was fun. Thank you so much, Melissa. And you know what? We're all in different countries, too. We are. We make it really cool, right? That is true. All right. Well, thank you. And thank you to our listeners for tuning in. And we'll be back next week with Sarah Bruschi to talk about disc dog training. Don't miss it. If you haven't already, subscribe to our podcast in iTunes or the podcast app of your choice. So our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzie Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzie for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty free by bensound.com. The track featured here is called Buddy. Audio editing provided by Chris Lang. Thanks again for tuning in and happy training. Be right. Thank you.