Recommended Q&As

About two weeks ago, I made the switch over to the raw diet for my 3 dogs. The two older dogs I switched cold turkey but the young Malinois, I am switching gradually. I am giving them raw veggies & fruits, ground meat, fresh chicken with bones, some yogurt, some cottage cheese, occasional egg. Plus I bought the Honest Kitchen product you add meat to. They love me!!! I have never had this much excitement at meal time. My question is with regards to possible low blood sugar. My two older do...

I recently joined a Schutzhund club with my dog. Although I love the sport, some members have recently suggested withholding food from him except for out of my hand and he works for it. They feel he needs work on his focus. My concern is that he's a 90-lb. dog, and the most I've been able to hand feed him doesn't even come close to what he eats a day. One of the other members has a dog he's been doing this with for about 2 months and the dog looks like a Holocaust victim. I'm not finding ...

I want to train my new puppy in Schutzhund (would rather to Mondio but can't find any help locally). I have started with bite work on my own and the basic obedience. Last Saturday, we went to a Schutzhund club for evaluation and instructions. I was told I should not be doing any obedience training whatsoever, just work on tugging and getting him to hold the bite. I was told to just let him be a puppy and let him be with no corrections, letting him be the boss of the house, and let him think h...

Cindy, I bought your Nosework DVD and I trained my dog. He did well in the first session, but the second session, he started using his eyes to search in the drawer spots. For example, when I put the food in spot 3 after several times in spot 1 and 2, he just immediately went to three using his eyes and not his nose, then after that he lost interest. What should I do?

Would your service dog vests work as a safety belt type harness? I can see this would be handy when I hike our farm up north, especially in orange. The handle would be perfect when we stop to talk with neighbors. I use a SAR harness now for that. Although I know it is somewhat controversial not to crate a dog in the car, I want the contact with my dog and the security she provides by her presence, so I buckle her up when we drive somewhere. Thanks for your advice!

Hi Cindy, I was watching Michael Ellis' Focused Heeling DVD and it raised a question for me. In many pet obedience situations, we try to fade the lure as quickly as possible. I understand the reasoning for maintaining the lure for muscle memory, especially in heel work. I was wondering, in competitive training, if you prefer to do the same when building muscle memory for downs, sits, and other commands. I could see the benefit in the repetition for building better responses, then naming wh...

Hi, I have a question that I hope you can guide me to the correct source... I have a question about training my new GSP puppy (4.5 months old) from getting kicked by my gelding. My goal is to go riding with the dog on trail. Do you have a reliable source as to how to properly approach this topic? My horse isn't a kicker--and my pup does respect him (the horse). But, all my work thus so far has been done on leash (introductions, etc.). I'm thinking about purchasing a Dogtra ecollar (...

Cindy and Ed, A friend of mine has a 10-year-old GSD who had ACL surgery about 3 years ago. The vet told her that usually once the right leg has an issue, the left leg won't be far behind. Low and behold, her dog has been favoring the left leg for a few months. I advised her to limit the dog's activity level for awhile to see if the limping goes away by itself. I realize that without viewing the dog yourself this is difficult to answer, but should we give it a 6-8 week period to re-assess ...

Dear Leerburg, I have a large German Shepherd mix male neutered age 3. He needs help in learning to socialize happily with other dogs. Can I buy a DVD or CD showing large healthy dogs playing together? My dog will watch TV if and only if dogs are on it. He can learn some by watching other large dogs playing without barking. Please reply. Thank You.

I spent a lot of time training my 20 month old German Shepherd in AKC Novice obedience. I felt we where ready for the ring. Ugly 2 days, would not sit on the stops, did not heal close, left me on the about turns. It was like she was in another place. She did stand, long sits and downs. On the recall she which was one of her strongest-came sat off to the side and did not finish. I took her out this morning and she did great. I already ordered the DVD on jumps thinking we where ready too move o...

Hi Cindy, I have a 14 month intact female Rottweiler. She was crate trained, and was relatively neutral in terms of her love of the crate. Suddenly in the last 2 weeks she is obsessed with the crate. There is no food or treat in the crate, and with the bedding removed her behavior is identical. She will spend more than half of the day inside the crate with the door open. She often runs back into it when she is out, with intensity. When she is taken outside her energy is great. Her appetite...

Hi Cindy, I'm a bit confused about the rules on puppies with toys. Ed says in several of his videos that the toys are his, and that he doesn't allow the pups to keep them. Yet in the ex pen video, there are toys in the pens that he says he rotates every 2 days. Can I get some clarification on this? My high prey drive GS pup is really getting bored. She's 9 weeks old. I am on steroid inhalers for asthma and the skin on my arms is very thin. Due to my pup being so mouthy, my arms are band...

Hello, I am trying to determine wether I should breed a healthy German Shepherd female we own. We have bred German Shepherds for 20 years but only have a litter every few years. We have an excellent female we have raised since a puppy from excellent German working lineage. Time has gotten away from us and by the time she will be whelping her puppies she will be 7+ years old. She is third generation from our breeding program and if not breed we will loose that lineage. She has never before...

Hi Cindy, My sister and I both have dogs at home that tend to bark when we are at work. We wanted to purchase the collars for both dogs but are concerned that this may limit them from playing with one another since they growl and play bark. Do you have any suggestions? Would keeping it on and off confuse the dogs? Thanks for your assistance.

Hey Cindy, I got the new Nosework DVD and just had a few questions. I didn't see puppies in the video (maybe I just missed them). I have a new puppy so was wondering when you start doing nosework with a puppy? Also, is there an odor that you typically start with so the dog always smells that at first, then switch later? If so when, do you add the additional odors? Thanks so much. Its an interesting sport and think it could be a fun side sport to play with. Thanks as always, David

Cindy, I have a 2 year old GSD (working line) with a high prey drive, strong nerves, yet a temperament on the softer side. Over the past 6 months, she has become leash aggressive (barking during our walk) at certain dogs - not all & hard to predict. This is despite us crossing the street well in advance to be as far away from the passing dog as possible and a strong pop correction on a prong collar (as strong as I can give - my weight is about 25 more pounds than my dog). She usually obeys...

Hello, I read quite a bit of your Q&A about dog biting and nothing really applied to my situation. I have 2 Golden Retrievers just under a year old. They are from the same litter, sisters. They are the best dogs I have ever owned but the problem is when we put them outside, they wrestle around and play. They are in no way trying to hurt each other and they never do this in front of my husband or I. The issue we are having is when they wrestle, they grab at each other's necks. One of th...

I have read your article about introducing dogs and babies and I found it helpful but I still have a question. We have a dog who is about ten years old, Lady. Lady has never shown signs of aggression towards anyone until recently. My son is now 11 months and Lady has suddenly started growling at him almost every time she is around him. When she isn't growling it is like she completely ignores his presence, she even jumped on top of him when getting into the car one day. We don't want to resor...

Hello, First, my wife and I wanted to thank you for providing us the information in Your Puppy 8 Weeks to 8 Months DVD and Obedience training DVD for setting us up with a wonderfully trained dog for life. The training has been fun and rewarding, so rewarding we are debating on doing more. We have a high-drive female Doberman that just turned 17 weeks old yesterday. I have been interested in protection work and Schutzhund competition but we don't have any good trainers locally. Also, I...

Hello, I got a beautiful english lab at 7 weeks old. Now she is 7 months old. She is very smart, but dominant. Since she was a pup she keeps biting my hands, feet and jumps a lot. The biting has gotten worse. If my husband and I are watching television, she will growl and try to nip at us. We correct her but she then jumps back and growls and tries again to bite. Different levels of growling and running around our condo like crazy dog until she wears herself out. We have put a lea...