Train your dog at home!

Getting a dog to obey your commands can be a huge challenge, which is why many would want to enroll into some dog training school. But you really don’t have to. It is your dog and it has a special bond with you, so why depend on an outsider for training it. You can teach your dog to follow your instructions right in your own house. The dog obedience training typically includes some primitive commands like sit, wait, come, etc.

Since this may very well be your first time, it is good to start with the most elementary command: “sit”. You first need to be equipped to train your dog. So get some snack that your dog loves and hold it above its head. This is a straightforward technique to teach the dog to sit. Intuitively it is clear that when the dog looks up at you and the treat, it has to push its hind quarters down.

Effectively it would sit. When that happens, praise the dog zealously to indicate to it that it is a very good dog and let it enjoy its reward – the treat. Note that while holding the treat you have to keep reiterating “sit” regularly. Continue this conditioning frequently; eventually the dog would start responding to your “sit” command.

Another order that you could coach your dog at home is “down”. For this command too, have a treat handy. Now hold the snack low near the ground and keep saying “down”. The dog would automatically bend lower to get the snack. Once it gets down, give it the treat to eat and again praise it. If you carry this exercise daily, you can familiarize your dog with this command and the expected action. With persistent training dog would react favorably to the “down” order.

The third trick that you can teach your dog at home is to respond to the “come” command. If your dog is a wanderer or someone that prefers to run away, this could be a vital trick up your sleeve. This is not a simple trick to teach, you may need support from another person, probably another member of the family or someone who is comfortable with the dog and vice versa. One of you would have to entice the dog by holding its treat and the other holds the dog.  The former will keep repeating “come” and the latter would let the dog go. The dog will automatically approach the person with the treat to get it. Once it reaches the destination, reward it with the snack and praise it for the task. Alternatively you could cuddle or play with it it too. Once your dog masters this task you can be in better control when you go out with your dog unleashed.

Lastly, teaching your dog to obey “stay” or “wait” commands. For this order your dog to “stay” and step away from it. It is important that you don’t praise your dog too early as the dog may try to follow you. If it really waits long enough then you can praise it. If you don’t time it properly, the dog would associate that command to a different action which is not what you want. In fact, this is true for all commands not just “wait”. The dog is not intelligent enough to understand human language. It associates sounds with the actions for which it gets rewarded. So remember this for all your commands.

In conclusion, you can see that dog obedience training is not rocket science. With patience, perseverance and practice you can train your dog at home. Remember though that not all dogs are the same and each adapts to the training differently. Be persistent and you will succeed.

Solutions to Dog Barking Problems

Dog barking is a very common problem. There are several dog owners and their families and neighbors that have been agonized by this problem. If you are one of them, then cheer up! There are workable solutions that the dog keeper can adopt to solve this seemingly perennial problem. The primary step is to find out the reason for the dog barking. Unless you get to the core of the issue, you are never going to solve it completely.

It is generally accepted in the dog expert community that boredom is a common reason for the dog barking problem. To fight boredom the dog resorts to incessant barking. One of the primary reasons for the dog getting bored is because the dog believes that it is getting insufficient attention.

The dog may not be getting its quota of play, hugging or even mere notice that it feels it deserves. This drives it to barking non-stop leaving the owner and people around tearing up their hair. While this may sound like a lost battle, it certainly is not. There are remedies available to address condition. Some are subtle, while others are bit harsh but they are effective solutions that have had good success in the past.

If you can ascertain that the dog barking problem is mainly because the dog is actively seeking attention, then it is possible to correct this situation. The dog behavior has to be conditioned so that uncontrollable barking is stopped. This conditioning exercise could involve training the dog to bark only at right times and not always. Besides, training collars are available in the market that are made particularly for dogs with barking issues. Using either of these approaches should solve the problem eventually.

Mostly the manner in which a dog acts or reacts is its natural behavior The owner needs to put in that extra effort to make sure that this natural behavior is modified to adapt to the domestic environment that the dog resides. The dog needs to be taught when is the right time to bark and when it is inappropriate.

A casual observation would reflect that the dog barking problem is aggravated when you are about go out or go to bed. Common sense says that the dog in both the cases does not like being left alone, so it starts barking like mad.

Experts say that in such situations, you should spray water on the dog’s snout and carry on without addressing the dog. This exercise would make the dog believe that incessant barking makes you spray water on its face and ignore it.

Seeing that barking is not having the desired effect, the dog would stop it. Alternatively, avoid the dog completely -do not even scold the dog for the misbehavior For an attention seeking dog, it doesn’t matter whether it is appreciation or admonishment; recognition is recognition. Thus, your rebuke could actually have an opposite effect on the dog. It would encourage the behavior rather than dissuade it.

Ignorance and water sprays are subtle ways of conditioning the dog. If they are ineffective you can try other alternatives like the use of devices like training collars. There are two categories of training collars designed to solve the baking problem: the citronella and the shock.

The use of shock collar may seem very harsh, but it can be a effective solution for the annoying barking problem for the dog keeper. Such collars send out an electric pulse to the dog’s neck whenever it barks unnecessarily or at inappropriate moments. This is very important. Barking is an essential ability of the dog, we do not want to get rid of dog barking completely, we just want to restrict it to right moment and right place. Obviously, if the dog encounters someone unknown it must alert us. The collar treatment can help achieve this desirable behavior.

The citronella collar works in the same concept, except that instead of the shock to the neck, it emits a spray direct to the dog’s nose. Over time, the dog would start correlating ill-timed barks with a repulsive smell. Even this can help solve the problem.