Most Popular Q&As

Hi Ed & Cindy, My Husband & I are in our late 50s & have a 8 month old Rhodesian Ridgeback dog. We have bought videos from you & think you are the best dog trainers that we have ever seen! Brilliant! We thought of attending Michael Ellis course. We saw this site & your training methods 2 months ago so up till then we hadn't done much training at all! It has been going well but we haven't managed to stop his mouthing, biting, jumping & humping. He dosent fit just one catagory! eg: nervous, ...

Hi, Last year a family member rescued a mini-dachshund vet estimated him at 4-5 months old from an abusive situation. The people in the house were being rough and generally neglecting him, allowing him to run loose and get into garbage, he was regularly "spanked" and smacked upside the head. In short these people lacked all common sense. When I got this pup he was obviously extremely submissive, submissively urniated at the drop of a hat and flopped on his back if a person even stood up...

Hello Ed, I am training my puppy - an 11 month old GSD - in SAR, and I am a beginner at this. A few days ago she did something very bad - she ran after a deer and was gone for 15 minutes. I know that this can only get worse, and I want to nip it in the bud ASAP. Do you have an article or a video that addresses this? I have received conflicting information from other trainers and the internet, ie: 1. Get an e-collar and correct her. (Sounds good, but how do I get a deer to coop...

Hello, I have a dog that has the largest prey drive and the strongest body I have ever had to deal with. He wants to go after every cat, squirrel and small yappy barking growling dog. He pulls all of the time not some of the time even with the prong collar on. I am not strong enough to hold him next to me and walk by me as I have buldging disks in my neck and back. When I try to resist him it hurts me. I have tried the halti collar and it did not work. I also have the gentle...

I know you are busy but I would appreciate some feedback from you regarding treat rewards. I am currently training my two year old rott/shepherd mix, a family pet, and will soon start training a GSD for police work - I'm a deputy sheriff in Oregon. I've done my homework on many different types of training methods. Most seem to be useless for my purposes. I doubt a strong tempered/dominate dog would really respond to those types of training which are geared for the politically corre...

Ed, You are a wealth of knowledge and we are "lucky," yes lucky to have you... Thank You. I am asking for your knowledge and wisdom today... Here's my problem... 2 days ago I was in Emergency with my 18 yr. old son getting his faced stitched up after Dragon bit him. Dragon was lying on my bed (don't even say it... I know about the bed). Jeff was walking into the room, at about a foot away from the bed he lunged up at his face and did a full mouth bite to his face. ...

Hey Cindy, I am contacting you because I am a dog trainer and I have recently stumbled across something that I have not encountered before and I am not exactly sure how to correct it. I have a 6 month American pit bull terrier that I am using for a demonstration dog. He is very smart, and attentive. I have taken him through the learning phase for basic obedience (come, sit, down, down stay), so he knows the difference between sit and down. But when entering the correction phase I have f...

My puppy just turned 9 weeks old and she has recently started barking and trying to bite at my legs. I can't decide what it is she's is wanting. It can happen at times when we are doing something she doesn't want to do, like walking away from something she was trying to eat. (which is everything outside). My response is to stand and tell her nope and if she continues I will put her either in her crate or expen. I've also been trying to direct her to playing tug, which she will do some but not...

Hi Cindy, I have purchased two videos from Leerburg and I am very satisfied with them. I purchased the Power of Training with Food By Michael Ellis and The power of playing Tug By Michael Ellis. Now, I would like to learn if Michael has any videos on how to teach control my dog when I have visitors to my house. My dog is very protective of my house which I like but I want to be able to let him know when someone is welcome and to turn off his protective behavior once the visitor is clearly wel...

I have a 10 year old son who likes to play with our 4month GSD. The issues I’m having is the puppy wants to bite on him. Even with re direction and giving a bully stick or elk antler chew. I think the puppy views my son as a litter mate. She doesn’t really bite on me but I’m the one training and feeding her. She does it more so with my husband who likes to get on the floor with her and roll around. She does it constantly with my son who likes to play tug with her and he tends to move pr...

Hello, I have an 8 month old akita. I was reading the article about Dog Parks and completely agree. I would not take him to one. I was wondering if you have the same feelings about doggy Daycare. We have considered trying a half day a week. it seems to be well run. They bring in new dogs into a separate area and introduce one new dog at a time starting with the dogs with the best temperament. Eventually they will be in the general area if all goes well. Our puppy has had have very little inte...

I'm a police officer in Connecticut. My police dog is two years old. We just completed 4 months of training and he is doing well. He already has a couple of finds. My question is that sometimes when he is tracking, he will stop to smell animal odor. Sometimes it's so bad, that I have to grab him by the collar to pull him from that spot. He will even lick the area, and taste whatever he is smelling. He's a great tracking dog, but if he smells a certain odor, he will completely stop tracking a...

My mother in law owns a beagle/lab/chow mix who is about 2 years old. Recently, she got another dog from the local shelter and was told by the shelter that she would have to neuter her chow mix in order to keep her new dog. The chow mix was neutered, but became increasingly violent towards humans and the new dog, where he had not been before. He DID calm down about 3 weeks after the operation. Two days ago, a friend of ours walked into the house with me, and the chow mix bit him! It didn't...

I have a 3 year old castrated Anatolian Shepherd, weighs 160 pounds; I weigh 110. I live part time (8 months) in Costa Rica, and I got him as a guard dog. He is great as a perimeter defense dog, because his size and bark are terrifying. Nobody breaks into my house. However, he has unpredictable episodes of aggression to other dogs. Worst with males, but has attacked females. He is trained in formal obedience, and has no trouble on airplanes, crowds, etc. He is great with people, cats, chicken...

Hello, I have a 10 month old Pembroke Welsh Corgi male that seems to be doing very well. He was neutered around 6 months and is usually very obedient. He's been crate trained since 8 weeks old and generally spends 4-6 hours out of the crate over the course of the day in 1-2 hour periods. To me he feels like a soft dog where only a verbal correction is necessary to get him to respond in most cases. A smack on the butt is usually more than enough to correct other more persistent things such ...

Cindy We would like to fly our dog out to CA. for two weeks for our grandson; it was mentioned to us that he could fly with us if he was a service dog or a dog in training. We were wondering if you could share with us any insight to this. Or if their is a way you might know where he could fly. Our daughter is having her second child, and we will be on grandparents duty with the first child. We just love our dog who is mid size. I hope this question makes sense. Thanks, ...

I am hoping you can help me with a problem I am having with my female German Shepherd "Gracie." Gracie is now 14 month old, she knows the basic obedience commands, but refuses to obey on recall. The minute she hears the door she will try to bolt through the door and refuses to come back until she is ready. We will live in a rural community in Fairbanks, Alaska and so far this has not caused a problem, but it is extremely frustrating as well as posing a potential future problem. She does chase...

Hi, I just opened the DVD sales newsletter e-mail on defense drive and it made me continue my thinking on this subject. I have a very weak-nerved dog and if I try to leave him for an out of sight stay he has a look of discomfort/stress and I realize he is not going to get very far in training if he feels this way - therefore, my thinking is he needs to feel different about the exercise... so I have been thinking if I could switch him out of pack drive (which is where I suspect he is since ...

I am sorry to bother you, but I really enjoyed your articles on raw feeding on your web site and I was wondering if you would share some of your experiences with me. I am the proud owner of three Australian Shepherds that all are fed raw and have been since they came into my life. Recently I purchased the youngest of the three from a holistic breeder, who is very knowledgeable and ethical. The puppy was raised raw and of course is very healthy, but within the past week he has become a bit...

Hi, Ed and Cindy! I've been enjoying your newsletter for a while, and I've got a pretty minor training issue I'm hoping you might be able to help with. My dog (papillon, 2 years) is not very toy motivated, and I've been trying to teach him to fetch as a game to get him some more exercise. He will chase a toy and pick it up, but the second I say his name to get his attention to call him back, he will drop the toy and run back to me, because he would much rather be with me than play ...