April '06

Cleveland's Source for Dog Training News and Information

What's New

Congratulations Ed, Robi, and Mireille!
We are pleased to announce that in March, Ed Dickson, Robi Kublin, and Mireille Baumoel all passed the CPDT (Certified Pet Dog Trainer) Examination! The CPDT is the first national certification for dog trainers, and there are currently only 20 CPDT-certified trainers in Ohio! Join us in congratulating our trainers. To learn more about CPDT, visit the website of the Certification Council for Pet Dog Trainers (www.ccpdt.org). In addition, all trainers at North Coast Dogs are members of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers (www.apdt.com).

Great Lakes Earth & Animal Fest
April 22nd is Earth Day! Bring your family, dogs included, to enjoy a day of fun and educational activities in historic downtown Vermillion. The event will include, among other things, a wildlife display, live music, silent auction, pet costume contest, and a dog walk fundraiser. For more information, visit the event website HERE. Sponsored by the World Animal Foundation.

 

Top of Page

 

Recipe - Peanut Butter Biscuits

If your dog is as "nuts" as mine is for peanut butter, you might want to try this...

Peanut Butter Biscuits

• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 Tbs peanut butter
• ¼ cup grated parmesan cheese
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 egg white
• 1 Tbs chicken broth

Mix flour and milk until lumpy. Add peanut butter and broth. Mix parmesan cheese with first 4 ingredients. Add egg white. Mix well or until it has the consistency of pancake batter. Add baking powder. Pour onto greased cookie sheet, making 2" drops. Bake at 400F for 15-20 minutes until golden brown. Cool.

Top of Page

 

Meet Our Winner - St. Patrick's Day Portrait Giveaway!

In our March newsletter, we announced a St. Patrick's Day contest, with the prize a sitting and prints from our pet portrait studio at our Lakewood/West Cleveland location. Thanks to everyone who entered! Non-winning entrants were given their own special offer, which brought in both Bella and Bogart, the two beautiful pups at the top of the newsletter.

Now... Our winner...

FRODO THE PUGGLE!

   

Thanks to Frodo's mom Tiffany for sending in that email and for bringing in Frodo - We had lots of fun!

For more information on The Studio at North Coast Dogs, please visit our website at www.northcoastdogs.com/photo_studio.php.

Top of Page

 

Article - Canine Communication: Building A Solid Foundation

Fun for him, not so much fun for you…

There are many fun, interactive ways to get outside and be active with your dog in the Cleveland area. You may choose to go hiking and walking with your dog or decide to get more involved in canine sport activities like Agility, Flyball, Rally-Obedience or Frisbee. Any of these outdoor experiences with your dog can be very fun and rewarding. It can also be absolutely painstaking and difficult if your dog is not behaving. So, what can we do to make sure that we get the rewards and not the pain most of the time? There is much that should be done to prepare for the fun and games. In order to achieve a level of success and ensure fun a majority of the time, you will need to make sure you have a good handle on the basics of your dog’s behavior. I like to compare your fuzzy friend’s behavior and relationship with you to construction of a building. It all starts with a foundation. If you don’t construct a solid foundation, your building will crumble.

The breakdowns in human/dog relationship tend to occur most often when we try to go too far, too fast and push the dog beyond its limits. When we push too hard, the animal starts to get stressed. Stress can create fear and anxiety. Fear and anxiety then can create aggressive responses. Aggression is an area we definitely want to keep away if at all possible. So, what does “laying a solid foundation” mean?

The Communication Barrier

It all starts with learning how to properly communicate with your dog. Have you ever tried to watch the channel on TV that is dedicated to all Spanish broadcasting and figure out what the people are saying? Unless you speak the language, you turn the channel very quickly because none of it makes sense. Take this logic and apply it to your four legged friend. If you are communicating to your dog in human language and the dog doesn’t understand what you’re saying, why wouldn’t he just turn the channel and find something he can understand? This is where the breakdown occurs in forming the relationship with our dogs. We start immediately trying to communicate to our dog with words. The problem is dogs don’t speak English, they speak dog. When we voice commands, dogs often don’t respond because the word has no meaning. We say it again, louder, as if yelling will automatically make the word mean something. We keep going and get more and more frustrated and angry. Meanwhile, the dog is either getting really happy because it appears you want to play with him that he starts jumping or, he doesn’t understand what you are asking for and goes to find something else to occupy his time.

All behaviors are learned behaviors. When allowed to be practiced, they will become well established, problematic behaviors. The dog effectively learns to “blow off” the human guardian, who is left simply frustrated and angry. This is the beginning of a relationship breakdown. What do we do to keep this from happening?

Goodie-Speak: You are the source of GREAT things!

First, you have to learn what’s valuable in your dog’s life and gain control over those items. This has nothing to do with punishment or discipline; it just means establishing yourself as the source of all items of value. Items that are valuable to a dog don’t always appear to have value in our eyes and vice versa. For instance, a dog doesn’t see a couch as a precious item that should be treated with care. A dog’s view of a couch is a potential very large chew toy that if worked on long enough will provide some cool stuffing and a soothing feeling on the teeth and gums. On the opposite side, if you stuff a Kong toy with Peanut Butter and wave it front of my face, I usually won’t start drooling in anticipation of you giving it to me. My dog will. If you learn to play the game right and set up certain items (not your couch) as the most valuable and then rotate those items in and out of circulation at well timed intervals, you can establish them as the proper chew items. The best part is they are always coming from you. Why would your dog not want to listen to you if you are the source of all things that matter in life?

Generally, there are five main items of value to a dog: attention, food, toys/play, territory and sleeping arrangements. Dogs can be pretty manipulative in how they gain unsuspecting control over such items; it’s important to pay attention and determine what the payoff is to the dog when they are offering behaviors you want to extinguish.

Body-Speak: Watch what you “say”

Second, the main way dogs communicate with each other is through body language. They pay attention to things like tail position and wags, head position, ear position, they communicate with tongue flicks and the position of mouths, the forward or backward posture of their body and they usually avoid prolonged eye contact with other animals or unknown humans. Knowing this, we can then apply these things to the way that we are communicating to our dogs. They will carry out exactly what they perceive we are telling them with our bodies. For example, you are walking down the sidewalk with your dog and you know that he will react when seeing another dog. You see the other dog first. Unknowingly, your body immediately tenses and you start to pull back on the leash. The dog feels the pressure on its collar, gets unsettled, looks at you and reads your tense body posture. The dog is then being signaled that a potential problem is coming, gets over stimulated and starts reacting. The dog is reacting and we want them to stop. We then start barking out commands which the dog is only hearing as “oh, they are barking too, this must be big!” which will perpetuate the problem. When all is said done, we have trained our dog to be leash reactive without even realizing we were doing so.

Learning canine communication, in my opinion, will be the most helpful tool you can use in training your dog. A helpful resource on the subject is the book “The Other End of the Leash” written by Dr. Patricia McConnell. This book is always available at our Lakewood/West Cleveland location and also online at www.dogwise.com, a resource for all things written about dogs.

Top of Page

 

Just For Fun

For all of you who have those trying "puppy parent" moments, it's always good to stop, take a deep breath, and remember...

 

What Dogs do for Us:

Catch Frisbees
Keep a night alone from being truly lonely
Get us outside on beautiful fall days, rainy days and snowy winter days
Listen to our singing
Treat us like celebrities when we come home
Warm up our beds on cold nights
Make our hearts more vigorous
Alert us to the arrival of the mail
Help us live a little longer
Make us smile
Agree with everything we say
Warm our knees with their chins
Provide a use for old tennis balls
Signal when a thunderstorm is coming
Pull sleds
Help lower our blood pressure
Test how fast we can run
Keep the squirrels from overtaking our yards
Teach us the meaning of unconditional love

 

Top of Page

 

Event Calendar

View printable version of this calendar.

Sign up for a class online.

Top of Page