How old should my puppy be before I start training?

“How old does my puppy have to be before I can begin training?”
This is a question I am asked often. The puppy in this video is 10 weeks old; but you don’t even have to wait that long! “Training” starts the day you bring your new dog or puppy home to live with you — [...]

Your agility dog: Building focus and drive (Part Two)

In Part One of this two-part series, we talked about what drive is, why it’s important, and the difference between drive and arousal. This week, we’re going to take a peek at some strategies to increase focus for dogs prone to arousal and talk about how to build drive.
Focus and agility
Now that we can tell [...]

Your agility dog: Building focus and drive (Part One)

In agility or other dog sports, we often hear about a dog’s drive. Maybe someone has said your dog has a lot of drive, or could use more drive.
What is “drive”?
Sometimes you’ll hear people talk about different types of drive in dogs, such as fight drive, play drive or prey drive. For our purposes, we’ll [...]

Charging the clicker

A short video demonstrating how to get started with clicker training by introducing your dog to the clicker.

Doggie Zen

“Doggie Zen” is an exercise I learned from clicker trainer Shirley Chong. This exercise is particularly effective in teaching your dog to focus on you amidst distraction.
Before you begin, remember…

A click is a promise that a treat is coming. Always offer your dog a reward after you click, even if you have made an error.
Reinforce [...]

Teach your dog his name

Let’s teach our dogs the most important word they’ll ever hear: their names. The good news is, this simple, life-saving word can be taught in literally a matter of minutes.
All you’ll need to do is grab your dog, a leash (if you need it to keep him nearby), and 50 or so really, really good [...]

Keep your dog from counter-surfing

If you’ve been a victim of the disappearing roast trick, you will identify with a recent episode at my house.
I left a sandwich unattended on the table to answer the phone. The conversation was short — less than a minute — but alas, it was too long. I returned to the room to find parts [...]