A Must Read Blog Post... How Training Is Killing Our Dogs

It's just painful isn't it? Like that Cesar Millan video with Holly. There is a rescue organization near me, and their training is also abominable, but thankfully not physical.

A friend of mine and her husband got a Rottweiler puppy from a reputable breeder in Pennsylvania. As an adolescent, the dog started to show signs of food aggression. They spoke to the breeder, who was also a 'trainer', who recommended some alpha BS that worsened everything. So he asked them to bring the puppy back for 'boot camp.' They did, and in the meantime my friend was considering returning the puppy to the breeder because her food aggression had gotten so much worse with the advice they'd been given. When they went to see Yuki after 'boot camp,' the dog was visibly frightened of the trainer and my friend couldn't, in good conscience, leave the dog there. So they brought the dog home, and not long after that, this dog -- barely a year old at the time? -- inflicted a Level 4 bite to my friend when she was turning towards the dog with the food bowl still in her hand. My friend's other dog intervened and probably protected her from further injury. The dog's anxiety level and aggression over food had gotten so severe with physical punishment that the mere presence of food + human made the dog explode. My friend, a woman, didn't intimidate Yuki enough to suppress her defensive aggression, as the trainer had done (the dog was also better with the husband, who had implemented the 'prescribed' corrections in the beginning). Like Millan's techniques, the dog had been provoked by training from going from growling and anxious over food to a full scale defensive attack.
 
Crying, tragic story. Also A & C with their friend's dog Yuki. And with each dog, and so many thousands we don't hear about, it could all have been prevented in the first place.

Just a few weeks ago there was a tragic news cast about a dog attack which killed the smaller dog and severely bit her owner. The owner of the other dog said he didn't know what caused his dog to break the lead and attack, as the dog had always been so good at home. Along with crying, my immediate reaction was to think 'was the attacking dog trained old school' as it happened right near the school which I took Ra Kismet to for two and half weeks before walking out. Also, with the dog who attacked Ra Kismet and myself, it would have killed a smaller, less agile dog and would definitely have severely bitten me, was definitely not trained using + Reinforcement methods. Even in my shaken state I could both hear and see by the way the woman spoke and handled her dog that it had been trained (if indeed the dog had received any training) very much in the 'old school' ways.

I've put Cassi's page on Ra Kismet's page and also gone over and liked/subscribed/commented on her page.

And I am so thankful for this forum, and the also the many youngsters on it who are starting out from the beginning training their beautiful dogs using + Reinforcement. And the older people who may have started out 'old school' but have made the conversion to + Reinforcement Training.

We can all work and hope for the day when 'old school' is something which few remember and many do not understand at all.

R.I.P. Cassi.
 
It's like A&C says painful, that things like this still happen anno 2012. We have techniques to make things out of scratch, but understanding a dog, our companion for more than 14000 years, it's basic body language/learning patterns still seems to be impossible for people to understand...

R.I.P. Cassi, as you no longer have to fear the world.
 
There are times in life when we must question why we do what we do. We must question what we are told. We must think for ourselves. I believe I saved Sundog from damage by questioning.

Poor Cassi. She learned too well what she was taught....
 
Oh my goodness. This is why I'm loath to spend money on a behaviourist to help with Alf's problem (guarding leading to biting) when so many of them give bad advice. Luckily, I know enough to know never to follow advice that includes any kind of punishment. Poor Cassie.... :(
 
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