Most Popular Q&As

I have a 13 year old lab called Flossy who is deaf and suffers from separation anxiety at night. She paces the floor and scratches at my bedroom door until I can't stand it any longer and I let her in. I have adopted a 2 year old lab/cockerspanial as companion to Flossy hopeing that this would fix the problem, but unfortunately it hasn't. Please can you help as I am getting very little sleep and it is effecting my health.

I need help with Protection Training! I have briefly reviewed your web site and downloaded your podcasts but I was hoping you could suggest some training or DVD so my new GS will Bark at the door, strangers etc. My previous GS was fabulous and performed all these functions perfectly with little training from myself. Unfortunately he passed away from Cancer this past summer and I am trying to train a new GS. The GS I have now I adopted so I do not know what happened in...

We've enjoyed your Puppy video as well as Basic Obedience 302...and still need a little help with "Come." We live on 5 acres and our 10 month old male GSD is very responsive and obedient while on the leash, whether it's the 6 foot or 20 foot line. But once we take him off the lead and go inside and then outside later to call him in or call him to stop barking, etc., he ignores me. The property is too big to have him drag a line around in case we need to call him, so we let him off once we go ...

Can I purchase an additional strap for my Educator collar so I can switch the receiver between collars to use on a 40 lb. dog or a 100 lb. dog?

Hello, I found your article on how to break up dog fights very very useful. I recently started working in a dog boarding and daycare facility. Some days there are as many as 125 dogs in the yards.?There are multiple yards and we do our best to divide based on temperament but yesterday was my first dog fight. I have lots of experience with big animals (steers, sheep, etc) but none with such sharp teeth. I ended up with a relatively minor bite, two teeth puncture wounds but no tearing. I use...

Hi Cindy, You have always been so helpful in the past. I attribute my dogs wonderful behavior to your DVDs and informative website. I purchased a Dogtra 280 ecollar and have used it training my dog (boxer-chow mix) with recalls since he was 1 year old. He responds well to the collar and marker training and is extremely well behaved. After my dog turned a year old he developed a shyness toward people (mainly men). He warms up after being ignored and approaches on his own terms and eventual...

Hi Cindy, Hope you are well. Just wanted to run 2 questions by you and Michael. 1. Deep Bark - in prey drive? I train Sch and would like to do as much as possible with my young dog in prey drive only. He has fantastic drives and a lovely friendly temper and I would like to keep it that way and continue training in prey drive only. This is why I like Michael's system so much. My only concern is the barking at the blind - at high level competitions it is desired that the dog shows what pe...

Mr. Frawley, I have a 10 week old Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy, who has been crate trained since we brought him home at 8 weeks. We don't take him out when he is crying except at night and when we let him out he goes to the bathroom then he gets put back in the crate. However, he still continues to whine for a half hour or so in the crate when we put him in during the day. Shouldn't this start to get better soon? Thank you for all your time and energy, Matt

What are your thoughts on the Solid Gold WolfCub food? I pick up my puppy on March 20th, and the breeder was pushing that stuff pretty hard. However, I've heard that Solid Gold practically gives the stuff to breeders to get them to recommend it. So, I'd like a second opinion on what I should be feeding the puppy. I asked him about Innova and some other brands, and he said those were good. But, he said he feeds the Wolf Cub to puppies to prevent their bones from outgrowing their joints. ...

Mr. Frawley, I have a question about bite work and the times when a dog may show aggression towards it's owner/handler. I am currently training a Dutch Shepherd in Schutzhund. I have been training for only a year. I have very little experience. I have two very good people teaching me all phases of the sport. One day while I was watching one of these guys do an exercise where they had their dog on a leash while the helper teased the dog. The dog wanted the helper bad, but this was an exerc...

Dear Mr. Frawley, You have been helping me previously so I dare to ask for your time again: My now 4 year old GSD, Harry, is very high prey orientated. My previous question was how to slow him down on a sport track. I followed your advise and those problems are gone. Thank you. I have never used food on the track, Harry is not fond of food, he'll leave his bowl for his ball only too willingly. He has done so many tracks, I train him since he was a pup. I did IPO, Int....

Hello, My partner is a 1 year old Blood Hound used for tracking. My dept. is just getting started with the K-9. I am just trying to find out any info on if you have to mark your K-9 vehicle with police K-9 or any type of warnings? just wondering if you can help. Thanks, S. B

Is there a thing as a "fear period" that puppies go through or is it just a way to justify weak nerve? A six-month-old pup that has always been friendly and inquisitive all of a sudden-without any bad experiences becomes hesitant about meeting people. He still is inquisitive with things, but hesitates when meeting new people. Once he has met them and accepted them he is his old friendly self. Karen

Hello Ed. When is the most appropriate time to start Training a golden retriever basic commands? I have read a lot of your articles on training and don't want to do any damage to her personality. We have been working on getting her to walk beside us during short walks around the block but we were told to invest in a choke collar to get her to stop pulling on the lease. She she is now 16 weeks is it to early for all of this? Thanks in advance. Lisa

Hi! I just got an 2 Month puppy (Golden Retriever/Lab/Cocker Spaniel mix) from the Humane Society. I live in an apartment with a roommate and our puppy doesn't have access to a yard. We take her out once a day, but that is about all we can do and it isn't like a huge green area. So we are trying to train it with the potty pads which I read you are against, but its the best we can do. So do you have any advice on training a puppy with the pads? We are also doing the crate training as well, but...

I have an 8 month old shepherd, his mothers side is german and east german. His dads side is some german and some american. I got him when he was 4 months, we have been doing basic obedience like heel , down , stay, ect. He took this really well and is ready to start the off leash side of the training. The problem is that during this time I didn't play with him as I should, and he doesn't like to play much or doesn't show much prey drive. He really doesn't care for a ball too much, he pla...

I have a Pekingese that may need a muzzle because he is starting to bite at times. This (pug-nosed cloth) muzzle looks like it covers the dogs eyes... Is this true? Thank you, Odallys

Hi, Yesterday I bought a 2.5 month czechoslovakian wolfdog. I have a 6 months female Husky and she knows that me and my boyfriend are the alpha pair. She never had growled at us, but today, when we gave the food bowl to her, I did something that I always do to her when she is eating: I pet her. She began growling at me and I said no to her. I've continued to pet her and she tried to bite me and same with my boyfriend. She has never done this to us. I think that she is trying to be...

My husband and I bought a German Shepherd pup at 4 1/2 months of age from a professional breeder with several past champions. We wanted to make sure we were purchasing a dog with a good pedigree and excellent temperament. The dog is now 11 months old and we are extremely disappointed and ready to give it back to the breeder. We don't know if it is our problem in training or the dog is the problem. The dog will obey my husband most of the time and will listen when he tells him to si...

I have what I believe to be a dominant dog in some respects. I have show dogs (Belgian Shepherds), one of my Groenendaels can be a hand full, most of the time he knows that I am boss and will behave but the thing that is the problem is when any one in the family goes out of the house he barks cries and screams even though there is still someone in the house. Also, this then sets the other dogs off barking and some time it progresses then to a howl. I have tried a number of different thing...