Training

[LILbearBYRD]

I'm trying to find a trainer for Bear ( who is 5 months old) but i don't know which would be best. Some of the trainers come to your house and do training every couple weeks, some do group classes, and one said they could train him in 4 to 5 hours :-\. I was just wandering what ya all thought? I'm slightly confused on how to pick the right trainer but i just don't want anyone.

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[Fallriver]

I find you get more out of private training than class training. In an ideal world, we would teach the puppies the skills at home, THEN we would take him to a class setting to ask him to do what he has learned with distractions.

It is very difficult in a class setting to effectively cover things like jumping up and door greetings, walking on the street, barking, and other behaviours that most people want to work on.

I would look for a trainer who doesn't use choke or prong collars, or corrections. These methods are unnecessary and create a lot of avoidance behaviour from your dog and you will find training easier and kinder if you look for a reward based trainer.

Beware of any trainer that claims to train a dog in 4 or 5 hours ???

[Bob Pr.]

It's never just a matter of training the dog -- more correctly it should viewed as training the owner to be able to train the dog and the owner sensitive to the dog's attempts to train the owner in both desirable ways (e.g., "I need to to go out to potty") and undesirable ways (such as, "if I act like I need to poop can we go out and play a bit").

Since you're going to be the ultimate and long term teacher, IMO it's most important to pick a beginning class which you find comfortable, rewarding, and effective. YOU are going to be the kindergarden, elementary school, etc., teacher and your Lab the student. Which one should get the most training -- the teacher of students or a student?

My suggestion, get a mainstream book on dog training and read it to begin understanding the principles. Others may suggest their favorite; for learning principles appropriate for dog training, my current favorite is Jean Donaldson's "Culture Clash" (For a broader, general understanding of dogs, I suggest Dr. Patricia McConnell's "The Other End of the Leash").

ONCE you begin grasping the principles of training, my suggestion is that you look for group classes. PetsMart, PetCo, local city/county Parks & Rec departments, dog clubs, etc., will have them. Go by and evaluate the instructors -- see who YOU think follows mainstream training principles (probably half DO NOT) and who runs the style of class in which YOU can learn the most.

Group classes are typically one hour, once a week. In Topeka, KS, 5 years ago at PetsMart, the cost was $80/8 sessions. The instructor was SUPERB, she'd been trained in several nationally known programs, each one for about 3-6 months, 5 days/week. She now has a private training program and her replacement was not very good.

An advantage of group classes is that you can quickly identify the mistakes the instructor is trying to get the owners to see they're making. That gives you more insight into your own actions. It's extremely difficult to be aware of all the little self-defeating quirks you may have without being evaluated by an expert.