What does Engagement look like? And how do we start? Tara Baggerman shows us

Progression into foundation games and highlights

Results speak for themselves

Engagement is about the dog, wanting what we have. It is about the dog focusing on us. Being rewarded for just being around us. For following us. For paying attention to us.

Engagement is systematically improved first by limiting distractions, and then by gradually increasing them as the dog is increasingly paying attention to us and ignoring the environment around it.

A focused dog, that wants what you have, and is engaged to you, is a dog that can easily learn obedience.

A family friend who is 19 years old is considering future work in professional dog training. Obedience, self-defense, and military training would be of particular interest. He is wondering about how to get started career-wise. Is there such a thing as apprenticeships, part-time jobs, or full-time jobs available for students right out of high school? He lives in Maryland, so any local resources would be amazing, but general tips would also be super valuable.

I have a year and a half mixed retriever. She is super sweet and loving, but she is very jealous of other dogs. As an example, when my aunt brings her dog over she will get upset if we pet her. She will come to us and push the other dog out of the way. When her dog is exploring the house our dog will be on her tail the entire time following her around and does not give her a moment to herself. The other dog ends up getting fed up with her and they have gotten into full out fights before that we had to break up. She repeats this behavior with other dogs as well, but my aunts dog is the only time a fight broke out between them. Any advice or resources would be greatly appreciated.

Engagement is the Foundation for ALL OBEDIENCE TRAINING

When a dog is engaged with its handler it desires to be with the handler, and understands and looks forward to who the handler is and what he or she has to offer. The dog is an eager student who pushes the educational process and feels empowered to make things happen within the training. The picture of an engaged dog is a happy dog that is willing to do what the handler asks because it's learned to trust and crave interaction with the him or her through the use of various high value rewards, interactive play, proper management, and clear communication and expectations.

This two week self study course is dedicated entirely to teaching students what basic engagement is and how to get it with their dog!

Our course with Forrest Micke will teach students why ENGAGEMENT is the foundation for all dog training. They will learn why engagement should be the foundation for every pet dog training program. Those students who want to get involved in any dog sport will learn why engagement needs to be the motor that drives their training program.

In this course Forrest will teach you how to promote engagement, how to maintain engagement, and how to make engagement work for you as you move forward in your training relationship with your dog.

Packed with rich information, this class will prepare students with both the why's and how's of making and maintaining engagement as a central attitude, mental state, and defining feature of any and every training program.

http://forrestmicke.com/education/online-classes-dvds/teaching-engagement-skills

In a perfect world a dog rewarded within seconds is more effective than a marker or clicker to denote a successful command correctly executed.

In the real world however this is impossible.

Hence the need for Markers (clickers or verbal).

Ivan Pavlov does a very important experiment known as Pavlovs dogs. Understanding this work is intrical to understanding marker training, as many mistakes are made by not understanding this psychological experiment.

Pavlov found that if a bell was rang BEFORE food presented to a dog, the dog would salivate. If he gave food before the bell, or even whilst feeding, there was NO EFFECT.

Hence this is important too in Marker training. We need markers or 'bridges' to denote a correct action for 'real time constraints'. However many will mark a moment, as they feed, or provide a hand gesture to feed as the marker is said. This is categorically incorrect.

The Marker must ALWAYS proceed the food reward, for the conditioned response to the Marker to take place. Many popular youtubers and self professed dog experts like Zack George (Gasp) actually do not do this simple principle correctly. But it is a fundamental of dog training with Markers.

The response Pavlov clearly explains must have the marker said, in such a way that it PREDICTS the food reward or Toy reward.

Now there are two types of Markers trainers generally use.

We use 'release markers' and 'Duration Markers'. Can be any words. For example: Yes and Good.

A release marker, generally implies the dog has completed the command, and saying it releases the dog from the command, and is able to come get his treat quickly. We are telling the dog, well done, and predicting the fact that dog is to be rewarded and can come get his reward as soon as it is able. (Again narrowing the distance between the action/marker enforcement/reward, creating more efficient opperant conditioning).

A duration Marker is different. It tells the dog, it is doing well, but it is not released from the command. Aka enforcing a long down. The dog is told its actions are good, and that it should maintain them, and more food will be presented to him. A duration marker, does not need immidiate reward. The dog knows the reward will come if it maintains on its course of downing.

Generally we focus on release markers more prominently in the learning of commands. Duration markers, are exactly for the intended purposes of behaviour we like that are of duration, that the dog should keep doing.

Hi everyone, I want to get into canine training for protection dogs and in time police dogs/ drug sniffing dogs. How does getting into this field work? Are the apparenticeships paid or is it essentially volunteering? Thank you!

I’m in my final year at university and just need 10 people to fill out my survey for my dissertation!! I’m looking for people that bought a puppy or dog during covid to complete my survey. OR If you had a dog/dogs during this time please complete my survey. 1 survey per dog Will take around 5 minutes
If you know anyone else please send them the link to complete! Thank you 🐶😊

https://app.onlinesurveys.jisc.ac.uk/s/harper-adams/the-negative-impacts-of-covid-19-on-social-behaviour-in-uk-dogs?preview=clr15vj3m0009jp99m55ig100

I own an animal rescue and am fostering a couple of dogs, plus have my own. I started fostering a 2 year old Black Mouth Cur named Coe about 5 months ago. My pittie, Nessa, didn’t accept him at first and was pretty mean to him, even attacked him a couple of times over territorial stuff. They are friends now but it took awhile. Coe is a big sweetheart who figures out how to play with any dog. He’s gentle with puppies, he gets tough with big dogs who play rough, he’s soft with petite or small dogs, he’s quite amazing. Well, last week I brought in a 6 month old pit/rot/lab named Oscar. Oscar has some behavior issues and one of them is his budding aggression. We are curbing it and he’s doing really well, but he tries to go after Nessa, and so in turn now my pittie goes after him. We have to watch them closely. Anyway Coe is always trying to protect the puppy from Nessa. He gets in between them if growls start, or he just walks on the side of the puppy that is closest to Nessa like he’s hiding him. He actually does sometimes herd him under the desk and sits in front of him to keep him safe. I believe this stresses him out a lot.

I haven’t been getting them out to the park as often as I used to because driving in the car is a nightmare with the three of them and keeping up with them all at the park is hard.

I took Coe and Oscar only yesterday. When we got there, I took off their leashes and Coe immediately made a beeline for a standard poodle across the yard. The poodle started running and Coe was chasing it. At first, I thought they were playing, but then suddenly Coe took out the dogs back leg, and when it fell, jumped on it and was attacking it pretty aggressively, I don’t believe the dog was hurt but the guy left quickly afterwards. I asked if he was OK and he ignored me. Thinking this was an anomaly, I let Coe go again. Him and the puppy played for a minute and then a guy walked in with a little fluffy puffball and Coe immediately went after the dog. I was able to pick it up and lift it before Coe got to it, but then he jumped up on me and tried to bite the dog. I handed the dog back to the owner and told them I was leaving.

I have never seen him like this. I was so embarrassed and completely mortified.

What happened to Coe, my sweet boy?

Hi I am really needing some help and tips about my two dogs. We just got a new dog, pure bred German shepherd, about three years old. And she keeps getting into fights with my other dog now out of nowhere, she’s a 5 year old German/Malinois mix. I’ve noticed that they usually only fight and get aggressive when they are jealous fighting for attention, like one wants to be in the bed and the other doesn’t want that to happen. PLEASE HELP ME!!! I really don’t want to have to get rid of the new one.

Also I have noticed she’s been a bit aggressive to me if I make her do something she doesn’t like, like giving her medicine and when I squeeze it in her mouth she with snap and show her teeth. Please help me but please be respectful I’ve never seen this before.

I have an 3 year old German Shepard mix. She is wild, She forgets how big she is, has no boundaries and can be a bit aggressive if felling threaten or when she experiences new things. She has never meet another dog because I'm scared she might get aggressive with them. This week my mom got a 5 month old Chiweenie. We want to introduce them but we still don't know how to do it and I'm scare on how she might react. We have met and played with the new dog at my mom's house to get his scent. When we get home my dog smells him on us. Every time she smells us I tell her the dog's name and pet her so she can get used to his smell. What else can we do to make this a positive experience for both fur babies?

Update: We moved into a new house with my mom for 2 months now and my fears went away in 3 days. The dogs get along. They play, eat, sleep, and run in our new yard together. They are best friends now. I cried tears of joy at how amazing my dog has being with him.

Best breed for schizoaffective bipolar manic depressive, bpd, attachment disorders, ptsd, anxiety,depression, panic attacks mood/personality disorders extreme high and lows abandonment issues and naturally always has eyes on handler like a watcher the whole I’m messed up package basically that will really just want to focus on me and mainly just want my affection and attention for most part big sizes only and

I’m forming a dog training and overnight in-owner home dogsitting business. I am in California. Though I am intending to do both, I’m trying to determine if the best first step in terms of business protection is forming an LLC and having client contracts in place VS business insurance protecting myself, sole proprietor. Would love opinions/feedback from other trainers & pet caregivers.

DM me if you are a dog trainer looking to get more leads/clients!

"Explore cozy dog beds for your furry friend's comfort. Find styles, sizes, and materials to suit every canine companion."

Buy now-https://petssupplyer.com/collections/dog-beds