It’s Saturday evening. I’m dirty, sore, tired—and fulfilled! That’s unusual. If you know me at all, you know that I despise manual labor. I always joke that I’m the hardest working lazy man you’ll ever meet. I don’t mind getting a leash in my hand and working with dogs, but other manual tasks like mowing […]
The Inconvenient Truth About Protection
In this post, I’m going to tell you something that will possibly make you angry. It tends to have that effect on people, whether I say it like a jerk or as sweetly as I can. I think that people react in this way because they have an emotional response to things that go against […]
In Praise of “Boring” Training
In this post, I’d like to share some of my thoughts about how boring dog training is. Now, I don’t mean what you’re probably thinking! Training is my profession, and it’s also been my passion since I was a teenager. I love it. But I’ve had a few experiences recently that helped me realize how […]
On Guard: Understanding Protection Dogs
Today’s article is going to break a few hearts. Every time I talk about the topic I’m about the delve into I feel awful, because I’m destroying someone’s idea about their dog. But I think that it’s crucial for people to understand. The myth I’m going to bust today is the idea that your dogs […]
Dogs At Work: Giving Your Dog A Job
Recently it’s become very popular for owners to put their dogs to work. I’m all in favor of this and believe it’s a wonderful way to help focus your dog, but it’s also something that has been greatly misunderstood in many different ways. I’d like to use this post to clear up some of those […]
Making the Cut: Intelligence Versus. Drive
Today I want to make a distinction between intelligence and drive. These are two very different concepts, but they are often confused with each other to a certain degree. People often have incorrect expectations for their dogs based on this misunderstanding. About eight years ago I was invited to do a demonstration with my dog, […]
Changing Contexts: Understanding Perspective
In this article, I’d like to talk a bit about context—in other words, how how dogs perceive information. At our company, we do a lot of boot camps. In these camps, both local people from here in Utah or people from out of state bring their dogs to us, and we train the dog and […]