Comments on: Iditarod – Day 6

By: Bryan

Bryan — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:43:24 +0000

Positive reinforcement is more effective than negative in any type of teaching. If you establish that there will be a reward, withholding the reward for bad behavior is all the punishment you need. The dog figures out that the behavior is not a winner and doesn’t do it again.

Like working with dolphins, you have to stay with things that the animal, including humans, already does, or is inclined to do normally, and then reward the behaviors you want.

Choke chains are worthless on German Shepherds. They will generally either break the chain or pull the leash out of your hand if they want to do something. The way their necks are built there is no “choke”, so what little point there was to the chain disappears. They get caught too easily, and are just a bad idea.

By: hipparchia

hipparchia — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 06:56:37 +0000

People miss the point that teams are playing when they pull that sled, and if they decide they aren’t having fun, they stop playing and nothing will make them do it again until they are ready. yep, they love this stuff! until something happens that makes it not fun anymore. back when i was doing dog rescue, one of the hardest things to get people to unbend about was making training their dog fun, fun for both them and the dog. and it takes so little to make it fun for dogs, there are so many things they love about life: toys? ubetcha. liver treats? check out that noms meme! running at full speed? the fluffy black dog loves this one. jerks on the leash with a choke chain? not so much. .-= last blog ..Run, ntodd, run! =-.